Paragon Solutions, a start -up that sells access to surveillance technologies, including the Spyware phone, has reduced links with the Italian government, according to reports in The guardian and Periphery.
On Thursday, quoting an anonymous source, the Guardian said Paragon had first suspended its contract with Italy on Friday after Whatsapp said he had disturbed a hacking campaign utilizing Spyware Spyware of Israeli starting 90 people. On Wednesday, Paragon finished the contract as soon as the company found that the Italian government had broken “the terms of service and the moral framework it had agreed under the Paragon contract,” according to the British newspaper.
The Israeli newspaper Haaretz later confirmed the Guardian report, adding that Paragon had terminated its agreement with two Italian government services – an enforcement service and an intelligence service – and disconnected their access to Spyware product called Graphite, according to the anonymous sources of the document.
The office of the Italian Prime Minister did not respond to TechCrunch’s request for comments.
Arturo di Corinto, representative of Agenzia of Italy by La Cybersicurezza Nazionale (ACN – or the National Cyberspace) confirmed to TechCrunch that ACN comes into contact with the legal representatives of META and that “it analyzes the assumption that, as you know, it is very delicate, given the participation of a foreign company and the supposed monitoring of a journalist. and human rights activist. ”
Di Corinto told TechCrunch ACN that he had no more information.
“I’m not talking about our customers and our activity,” Paragon’s chief executive, and co -founder Idan Nurick at TechCrunch, refused to comment on Italian affairs as well as Whatsapp’s allegations.
TechCrunch also arrived at Paragon’s executive president, John Fleming, who did not respond to a request for the press.
Citizens aimed at twelve European countries
In a statement On Wednesday, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni declined to take part in the Spyware campaign revealed by Whatsapp. The prime minister’s office said that legally protected issues, including journalists, do not target the Italian intelligence services.
After Whatsapp revealed the existence of the spyware campaign, three people have progressed, claiming that they had targeted. All three of them have been criticized by the Italian government.
The first victim was Francesco CancellatoThe Website News Manager Fanpage.itpublished last year a documentary conviction In the youth wing of the far -right Meloni party, showing members who make racist observations and chanting Nazi and fascist slogans.
On the same day, a Libyan activist living in Sweden, Husam El GomitiAnd he has criticized the transactions of Italian and Libya to stop immigrants from crossing the Mediterranean, he said he had received a notice from Whatsapp informing him that he had targeted.
On Wednesday, Luca Casarini, co -founder of Mediterranean saving peopleA non -governmental organization that helps immigrants also said it was targeted.
Contact us
Do you have more information about Paragon Solutions and this spyware campaign? From a non-work device, you can contact Lorenzo Franceschi-bicchierai safely on the signal on +1 917 257 1382, or via the telegraph and keybase @lorenzofb or email. You can also contact TechCrunch via securedrop.
It is likely that more victims will soon be revealed, and not just in Italy. The Italian government said it had contacted WhatsApp about the question of the company’s claims and that the company’s post-ownership said that there were phone users in Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Sweden.
None of the governments of these country, either through their US embassies or through other government bodies, has responded to TechCrunch’s requests for comments.
On Tuesday, Paragon’s Fleming told TechCrunch that the company was counting on the US government and its undefined “allies” as customers. EURACTIV reported Thursday that the company has a subsidiary in Hamburg, Germany.
Fleming also said that Techcrunch that Paragon “requires all users to agree on terms and conditions that explicitly prohibit the illegal targeting of journalists and other civil society elements”.
“We have a zero tolerance policy over this target and we will end our relationship with any customer who violates the terms of service,” Fleming said.
It seems that in the case of its Italian customers, Paragon followed with its policy.
