Rajeev Chandrasekhar, minister of state for electronics and information technology. Photo: facebook/Rajeev Chandrasekhar, MP.
New Delhi: Despite the United States blacklisting the NSO Group
in connection with the Pegasus spyware issue last month, the Union
ministry of electronics and information technology in response to a
question in parliament on Friday, December 3, said it had “no
information” about the matter.
In response to another query, the ministry also stated that there was “no proposal” to ban a group by that name.
The question on NSO Group was raised by
Samajwadi Party MPs Vishambhar Prasad Nishad and Sukhram Singh Yadav in
the Rajya Sabha on Friday. They asked the minister of electronics and
information technology “whether the United States of America has
blacklisted NSO Group and Candiru, for providing Pegasus spyware, which
has been used to maliciously target journalists, embassy workers and
activists”.
In his response, Rajeev Chandrasekhar,
minister of state for electronics and information technology, said, “No
such information is available in the Ministry”.
The
reply came despite the fact that the US Department of Commerce only last
month blacklisted two Israeli spyware companies, NSO Group and Candiru,
and added them to the list of foreign establishments that engage in
malicious cyber activities.
Blacklisting the NSO Group, the Biden administration had stated that the company knowingly supplied spyware that
was used by foreign governments to “maliciously target” the phones of
dissidents, human rights activists, journalists and others. A report by New York Times
had stated as per the Commerce Department, the NSO Group and another
Israeli company, Candiru, acted “contrary to the national security or
foreign policy interests of the United States”.
That the minister of state for electronics
and information technology has no information on the development is
surprising considering the heat the Pegasus spyware issue generated in
the Monsoon Session of parliament when the opposition had continuously
protested against the Pegasus controversy.
Pegasus Project
The opposition had through the session
sought explanation and discussion from the government on the revelations
of the Pegasus Project, which was a collaborative investigation that
involved 17 news organisations – including The Wire – into a database of phone numbers selected for possible and successful surveillance by clients of the Israeli NSO Group.
The Wire‘s reports had revealed
that those in the list included opposition politicians, journalists,
senior government employees and activists. The Pegasus Project, which
investigated the leak of 50,000 phone numbers of potential surveillance
targets, had also revealed how NSO Group’s spyware was used to enabled
human rights violations and those under surveillance included heads of
state, activists and journalists.
In India, some of the prominent names which
figured in the list included Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, his aides
Alankar Sawai and Sachin Rao; election strategist Prashant Kishor;
Trinamool Congress MP and Mamata Banerjee’s nephew Abhishek Banerjee;
former IAS officer and Cabinet minister Ashwini Vaishnaw; Cabinet
minister Prahlad Singh Patel; and former Vishwa Hindu Parishad head
Pravin Togadia.
Meanwhile in response to another query from
the two MPs on “whether the Ministry has also banned the NSO Group in
India,” Chandrasekhar responded that “there is no proposal for banning
any group named ‘NSO group’.”
Earlier this year in August, the Centre had
also disallowed a question in the Rajya Sabha by Communist Party of
India MP Binoy Viswam, on whether the government had entered into a
contract with the Israeli cybersecurity firm.
The
question was dismissed by the Centre citing Rule 47 (xix) of the Rules
of Procedure and Conduct of Council of States (Rajya Sabha) that deals
with the admissibility of questions. The government only stated that
“the ongoing issue of Pegasus” was sub-judice as “several PILs have been
filed before the Supreme Court”.
The Pegasus Project is a collaborative investigation that
involves more than 80 journalists from 17 news organisations in 10
countries coordinated by Forbidden Stories with the technical support of
Amnesty International’s Security Lab. Read all our coverage here.
source ; the wire
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(With input from news agency language)
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