FBI Almost Used NSO Pegasus Spyware for Domestic Surveillance

According to the New York Times, the FBI was close to using commercial software to aid in its investigations. The NSO Group is an Israeli company that has been involved in a number of spy scandals around the world.

The FBI was considering procuring a system called "Phantom" from NSO that could be used to hack any phone in the US, according to the Times. The tool was a variant of NSO's more well-known malware and had the ability to spy on mobile devices. The FBI was thought to be using it in criminal investigations.

Privacy concerns were raised after the news of the potential deal broke.

At a congressional hearing earlier this year, the FBI director implied that the bureau had never intended to use the NSO tool. The officials made it sound like they were doing research on how bad actors could use such tools, but they were not interested in using them. The bureau's interest in NSO's tools would allow the government to figure out how bad guys could use it.

According to new documents uncovered by the Times, the government wanted to use the tools for their own criminal investigations. The documents, retrieved via a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, include a number of internal FBI PowerPoint presentations that discussed how the bureau could use hacking tools. Proposed guidelines for district attorneys' offices across the country on how to approach the process of criminal were included in a 25-page memorandum produced by the bureau's Criminal Investigative Division. The document for potential use of the tool was prepared by the criminal investigative division. The Times is reporting.

The internal FBI documents and legal briefs submitted on behalf of the bureau give the most complete picture to date of the bureau’s interest in deploying Pegasus. While heavily redacted, the internal documents show that, from late 2020 until the summer of 2021, the FBI had demonstrated a growing interest in potentially using Pegasus to hack the phones of FBI targets in criminal investigations.

If the Justice Department responds, the story will be updated.

The government spent close to two years deciding if it could legally use the product without violating America's legal and constitutional restrictions. The controversy surrounding NSO spiked in the middle of last summer with the publication of the " Pegasus Project", a journalistic expose that detailed the degree to which NSO's tools had been abused by foreign governments to spy on journalists, activists, human rights lawyers, politicians, and many others The FBI stopped using the company's products after controversy erupted.

NSO has struggled since then. After the FBI deal fell through, NSO was placed on the Commerce Department's Entity List, an inventory of foreign firms that have been deemed to be working "contrary" to America's national security interests. American firms can't provide parts and services to listees if they're included on the list. NSO has been cut off from investment and critical assets. After the Biden administration spoke out against the deal, it fell through.