Israeli spyware was used to hack the phone of a former Greek member of the European Parliament while he was serving on a committee investigating spyware abuses in Europe, according to a report by Citizen Lab published on Friday, Anadolu reports.
The University of Toronto-based research group said that forensic analysis found Stelios Kouloglou’s iPhone was successfully infected with Pegasus spyware, developed by Israeli company NSO Group, in October 2022 and again the next March.
Kouloglou, a journalist and former MEP, was at the time a substitute member of the European Parliament’s PEGA committee, which was established to investigate the use of Pegasus and equivalent surveillance spyware in EU member states.
Citizen Lab said the infections took place during key periods of PEGA committee activity and could have exposed non-public information, confidential documents, and internal committee deliberations.
“The spyware would have likely captured non-public information about committee activities, possibly breaching EU parliamentary confidentiality and privilege frameworks,” the report said.
