An international investigative consortium reported on Monday that Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, former election commissioner Ashok Lavasa, and two sitting Union ministers were among prominent people potentially targeted by Israeli phone hacking software, igniting a political storm on the first day of Parliament’s Monsoon Session.
The investigation identified public health experts Gagandeep Kang and M Hari Menon, as well as diplomats from at least five countries, as potential targets of Israeli firm NSO Group’s Pegasus software. The woman who accused then-Chairman of the Supreme Court of India Ranjan Gogoi of sexual harassment in 2019 and her relatives, as well as election strategist Prashant Kishor, were also on the list.
In India, decoding the legality of “authorised” surveillance
The high-profile government names were Union information technology minister Ashwini Vaishnaw – who defended the government in Parliament just hours before being named a potential hacking target – and Jal Shakti minister of state Prahlad Singh Patel.
The consortium, which includes 17 media organisations including The Guardian, The Washington Post, Le Monde, and Indian news website The Wire, announced on Sunday that 38 Indian journalists, including three current Hindustan Times employees and one from sister publication Mint, were among 180 journalists worldwide who could be targeted.
To be sure, as the investigation’s methodology explains, the presence of a phone number does not imply that it was hacked — only that it was of interest.
The government has categorically denied any involvement
“Aap Chronology Samajhiye! [Understand the chronology] This is a report by the disrupters for the obstructers. Disrupters are global organisations which do not like India to progress. Obstructers are political players in India who do not want India to progress,” Union home minister Amit Shah said in a statement.
Vaishnaw told Parliament that the allegations were an “attempt to malign Indian democracy and its well-established institutions”. “Time tested processes in our country are well-established to ensure that unauthorised surveillance does not occur,” he said in his first speech as IT minister in the Lok Sabha.
The opposition, on the other hand, demanded Shah’s removal and an investigation into the Prime Minister’s role. The ruling party has been dubbed Bharatiya Jasoos (spy) Party by Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala.
“Modi government has used Israeli spyware for spying on political leaders, judges, an election commissioner and even on his own ministerial colleagues. The Modi government has launched an attack on the country,” he said.
The Congress and the TMC have announced that the issue will be raised in Parliament on Tuesday.
Pegasus is a highly invasive malware that can turn on a phone’s camera and microphone as well as access data, effectively turning it into a pocket spy. It can be installed without tricking a user into starting a download in some cases. In 2019, WhatsApp revealed that 121 Indian users were among those spied on globally by unnamed entities using Pegasus.
