The founder of the Israeli surveillance technology company behind the Predator spyware reiterated that his company, Intellexa, only does business with national governments – a claim he said is supported by the testimony provided recently by the head of Greece’s national intelligence agency EYP before a Parliament panel.
The wiretapping scandal, sometimes referred to as “Greek Watergate,” revealed the hacking of dozens of phones belonging to senior government ministers, military officials, opposition leaders, and journalists, using Predator.
“We are a technology provider, not mercenaries. Our technology is used every day to support the security of millions of people worldwide. We sell to government agencies in accordance with all required regulations, but we never operate the systems on their behalf,” Tal Dilian, a former Israeli intelligence officer, said in a written statement to newspaper Efimeritha ton Syntakton published Tuesday.
“We welcome the clear acknowledgement in Parliament, confirmed by the head of the EYP in his closed-door testimony … that there was never a joint operations center between the four private individuals and the intelligence service,” he said, referring to the testimony of Themistoklis Demiris, who appeared on May 20 before a session of Parliament’s transparency committee to testify on the spyware scandal, following a request by opposition parties.
