WhatsApp made a stunning announcement last night, something completely unexpected for users all over the world, and this in the conditions where until now the platform had a completely different approach. WhatsApp has announced that it has sued the NSO Group company following a hack due to which the encrypted communication system that the messaging platform has was broken, and this is a first for the company owned by Facebook.
WhatsApp also confirmed an extremely important vulnerability due to which users' phones could be infected with spyware through a video call, even if they rejected the call. It seems that this hack was used at that time to attack journalists from various corners of the world, the hack having the name Pegasus and being developed by NSO Group, and those from WhatsApp are now retaliating with an open lawsuit in the USA.
WhatsApp: AMAZING announcement with a RADICAL DECISION by Facebook
WhatsApp is suing NSO Group for developing this hack, although the Israeli company said it did not use it directly, but only sold it to various governments around the world. WhatsApp still has evidence of the fact that NSO Group used this hack against some people, and that it would have violated American federal legislation, which could also lead to a criminal investigation led by those from the FBI.
“In May 2019, we stopped a highly sophisticated cyber attack that exploited our video calling system to send malware to the mobile devices of multiple WhatsApp users. WhatsApp also filed a complaint in US court attributing the attack to a spy company called NSO Group and its parent company Q Cyber Technologies. The complaint alleges that they violated both US and California laws, as well as WhatsApp's Terms of Service, which prohibit this type of abuse."
WhatsApp would have had the servers used by the NSO Group in this attack, and some of the accounts in the platform would have been "linked" to those of the Israeli company, the Americans saying that the Israelis did not hide their tracks very well. WhatsApp says that until now only 1400 people would have been the targets of this extremely complex attack, although it was said then that in reality the figure would be much higher, so everything had specific targets.
WhatsApp will have a rather long battle in court with NSO Group, the Israeli company denying all the accusations made by the Americans, so it will be interesting to see how the hostilities will unfold.