Is your phone vulnerable ?
Is your phone vulnerable ?
As data evolved, breach becomes rampant and security is at stake.
That is why many companies have embarked on several strategies to protect the data of their clients.
A recent report from aljezeera documentary shown that there are more to security breaches than anticipated. And one company that is dominant in this security breach program is NSO Group company situated in Israel.
NSO Group is a technology company based in Israel founded in 2010 and one of its products is “Pegasus“.
Pegasus is spyware when installed on the user’s device has the option to copy a quantum of data the user won’t notice. This company came to light in 2016 and has been in the news for security breaches on several platforms.
Android and iOS devices have not been an exception from the predicament this company has laid on innocent users.
Who has access ?
NSO Group sells its software to Government agencies in the name of detecting and fighting against terrorism and crimes but this software is used in the wrongful data surveillance strategies by various institutions and agencies.
The nature of the software target and individuals whose phones have been hacked raises the question. Is this meant for detecting and fighting against terrorism and crimes?
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Various governments had bought the software for their own use. Power-hungry governments have used this software in targeting their opposition and individuals who don’t agree with their strategies of governance.
A report from Aljazeera indicated one mobile phone belonging to Aljazeera Arabic was infected with a kind of software in mid-2020.
Working with a data surveillance organization called “citizen lab” an international research laboratory based in Canada, they were able to identify how one of the advanced spyware was used in monitoring Aljazeera journalists.
One Social media platform like what’s up had a similar experience when Pegasus software was used on the vulnerability portion of what’s up to code.
The Breach.
In 2019, What’s up owned by Facebook accused NSO spyware of hacking 1400 users.
The software was used to place a call on the victim’s device.
This works even if the user does not answer the call. An iOS and macOS user had their portion back in 2016 when citizen lab released a report concerning “a zero-day exploit designed to infect a recognized human right defender, Ahmed Mansoor by a Government.
Apple released an update to patch the vulnerability
The vulnerability
Even though there’s a zero-click vulnerability where the user does not have to install the software before the spyware can take control of the device, some measures can be put in place to minimize the impact
What can you do to prevent such attacks?
Even though there’s zero-click vulnerability where the user does not have to install the software before the spyware can take control of the device, some measures can be put in place to minimize the impact
1. Always updates or install the latest version of the software provided by the parent company
2. Avoid clicking on unknown links and suspicious messages from unknown sources.
3. Allows system signal detection on the use of microphone and camera by both systems
and third-party apps.
4. In terms of private conversations switch off the device or reside at gadget-free environs.
5. If the above doesn’t resolve the problem get rid of the device and change your number. This is because factory resets of affected devices won’t remove the spyware from the affected devices.
Remember in the case of Pegasus spyware, it’s not installed on the system storage it’s rather on temporary memory.
Watch the documentary below by Aljazeera
