The Israeli software Pegasus, which would have potentially made it possible to spy on some 50,000 people around the world, is a much more advanced technology than that of traditional eavesdropping.
As noted on Europe 1 Bernard Barbier, former technical director of the DGSE, a real market has been formed around this type of espionage.
INTERVIEW
According to an investigation published Sunday by a consortium of 17 international media, including
Le Monde
, the Pegasus software, developed by the Israeli company NSO Group, would have made it possible to spy on the numbers of 50,000 people around the world, including at least 180 journalists, 600 politicians, 85 human rights activists and 65 business leaders from different countries. About thirty French personalities were said to have been spied on via this tool on behalf of Morocco. Still according to
Le Monde
, Emmanuel Macron's number appeared on the lists of targeted phones when he was Minister of the Economy.
But how could such a large number of people, some using highly secure devices because of their function, have been spied on with complete impunity?
"An extremely high level of sophistication"
"We are in a computer intrusion, it is cyber-espionage. It is not a simple listening system. This extremely sophisticated software uses flaws in the operating systems of phones, which "it is Android or Apple", explains to Europe 1 Bernard Barbier, former technical director of the DGSE, who created the first teams dedicated to this type of problem within French foreign intelligence.
"These flaws allow software to be passively injected into the phone. There is no need to click, for example, on an infected email like in phishing techniques. It really is a level of sophistication. extremely high. "
>>
Find the morning show of the day in replay and podcast here
A very precious commodity
"This is an intrusive system much more important than that of legalized administrative or judicial wiretapping", abounds Bernard Squarcini, former boss of the Central Directorate of Internal Intelligence, also interviewed by Europe 1. "In the field of research and development, the Israeli government has created formidable startups, ”he points out.
Some of these companies, like NSO which publishes Pegasus, pay hackers to work to find as yet undetected, and therefore unpatched, flaws in standard phone software from Apple, Samsung and others. "There is an international market for exploitative faults, with companies like Zerodium, a website which buys these faults", notes Bernard Barbier. "The most expensive vulnerabilities are the vulnerabilities in the Apple iOS operating system. They can fetch $ 2 million."