surveillance | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

A federal jury on Tuesday decided that NSO Group must pay Meta-owned WhatsApp WhatsApp approximately $168 million in monetary damages, more than four months after a federal judge ruled that the Israeli company violated U.S. laws by exploiting WhatsApp servers to deploy Pegasus spyware, targeting over 1,400 individuals globally. WhatsApp originally filed the lawsuit against NSO Group in 2019, accusing the latter of using Pegasus to target journalists, human rights activists, and political dissidents. Court documents released as part of the trial have revealed that 456 Mexicans were targeted during the campaign, followed by 100 victims in India, 82 in Bahrain, 69 in Morocco, and 58 in Pakistan. In total, individuals across 51 different countries were targeted. The attacks leveraged a then zero-day vulnerability in WhatsApp's voice calling feature ( CVE-2019-3568 , CVSS score: 9.8) to trigger the deployment of the spyware.  In a ruling issued in December 2024, United States ...

In a new campaign detected in March 2025, senior members of the World Uyghur Congress (WUC) living in exile have been targeted by a Windows-based malware that's capable of conducting surveillance. The spear-phishing campaign involved the use of a trojanized version of a legitimate open-source word processing and spell check tool called UyghurEdit++ developed to support the use of the Uyghur language. "Although the malware itself was not particularly advanced, the delivery of the malware was extremely well customized to reach the target population and technical artifacts show that activity related to this campaign began in at least May of 2024," the Citizen Lab said in a Monday report. The investigation, according to the digital rights research laboratory based at the University of Toronto, was prompted after the targets received notifications from Google warning that their accounts had been at the receiving end of government-backed attacks. Some of these alerts we...

An Android malware family previously observed targeting Indian military personnel has been linked to a new campaign likely aimed at users in Taiwan under the guise of chat apps. "PJobRAT can steal SMS messages, phone contacts, device and app information, documents, and media files from infected Android devices," Sophos security researcher Pankaj Kohli said in a Thursday analysis. PJobRAT, first documented in 2021, has a track record of being used against Indian military-related targets. Subsequent iterations of the malware have been discovered masquerading as dating and instant messaging apps to deceive prospective victims. It's known to be active since at least late 2019. In November 2021, Meta attributed a Pakistan-aligned threat actor dubbed SideCopy – believed to be a sub-cluster within Transparent Tribe – to the use of PJobRAT and Mayhem as part of highly-targeted attacks directed against people in Afghanistan, specifically those with ties to government, mil...

The governments of Australia, Canada, Cyprus, Denmark, Israel, and Singapore are likely customers of spyware developed by Israeli company Paragon Solutions, according to a new report from The Citizen Lab. Paragon, founded in 2019 by Ehud Barak and Ehud Schneorson, is the maker of a surveillance tool called Graphite that's capable of harvesting sensitive data from instant messaging applications on a device. The interdisciplinary lab said it identified the six governments as "suspected Paragon deployments" after mapping the server infrastructure suspected to be associated with the spyware. The development comes nearly two months after Meta-owned WhatsApp said it notified around 90 journalists and civil society members that it said were targeted by Graphite. The attacks were disrupted in December 2024. Targets of these attacks included individuals spread across over two dozen countries, including several in Europe such as Belgium, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, Austria,...

A 23-year-old Serbian youth activist had their Android phone targeted by a zero-day exploit developed by Cellebrite to unlock the device, according to a new report from Amnesty International. "The Android phone of one student protester was exploited and unlocked by a sophisticated zero-day exploit chain targeting Android USB drivers, developed by Cellebrite," the international non-governmental organization said , adding traces of the exploit were discovered in a separate case in mid-2024. The vulnerability in question is CVE-2024-53104 (CVSS score: 7.8), a case of privilege escalation in a kernel component known as the USB Video Class (UVC) driver. A patch for the flaw was released for the Linux kernel in December 2024. It was subsequently addressed in Android earlier this month. It's believed that CVE-2024-53104 was combined with two other flaws – CVE-2024-53197 and CVE-2024-50302 – both of which have been resolved in the Linux kernel. They are yet to be included i...

OpenAI on Friday revealed that it banned a set of accounts that used its ChatGPT tool to develop a suspected artificial intelligence (AI)-powered surveillance tool. The social media listening tool is said to likely originate from China and is powered by one of Meta's Llama models , with the accounts in question using the AI company's models to generate detailed descriptions and analyze documents for an apparatus capable of collecting real-time data and reports about anti-China protests in the West and sharing the insights with Chinese authorities. The campaign has been codenamed Peer Review owing to the "network's behavior in promoting and reviewing surveillance tooling," researchers Ben Nimmo, Albert Zhang, Matthew Richard, and Nathaniel Hartley noted, adding the tool is designed to ingest and analyze posts and comments from platforms such as X, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, Telegram, and Reddit. In one instance flagged by the company, the actors used ChatG...

Apple is removing its Advanced Data Protection (ADP) feature for iCloud from the United Kingdom with immediate effect following government demands for backdoor access to encrypted user data. The development was first reported by Bloomberg. ADP for iCloud is an optional setting that ensures that users' trusted devices retain sole access to the encryption keys used to unlock data stored in its cloud. This includes iCloud Backup, Photos, Notes, Reminders, Safari Bookmarks, voice memos, and data associated with its own apps. "We are gravely disappointed that the protections provided by ADP will not be available to our customers in the UK given the continuing rise of data breaches and other threats to customer privacy," the company was quoted as saying to Bloomberg. "ADP protects iCloud data with end-to-end encryption, which means the data can only be decrypted by the user who owns it, and only on their trusted devices." Customers who are already using ADP ...

An analysis of a data leak from a Chinese cybersecurity company TopSec has revealed that it likely offers censorship-as-a-service solutions to prospective customers, including a state-owned enterprise in the country. Founded in 1995, TopSec ostensibly offers services such as Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) and vulnerability scanning. But it's also providing "boutique" solutions in order to align with government initiatives and intelligence requirements, SentinelOne researchers Alex Delamotte and Aleksandar Milenkoski said in a report shared with The Hacker News. The data leak contains infrastructure details and work logs from employees, as well as references to web content monitoring services used to enforce censorship for public and private sector customers. It's believed that the company provided bespoke monitoring services to a state-owned enterprise hit by a corruption scandal, indicating that such platforms are being used to monitor and control public...

Apple on Monday released out-of-band security updates to address a security flaw in iOS and iPadOS that it said has been exploited in the wild. Assigned the CVE identifier CVE-2025-24200 (CVSS score: 4.6), the vulnerability has been described as an authorization issue that could make it possible for a malicious actor to disable USB Restricted Mode on a locked device as part of a cyber physical attack. This suggests that the attackers require physical access to the device in order to exploit the flaw. Introduced in iOS 11.4.1, USB Restricted Mode prevents an Apple iOS and iPadOS device from communicating with a connected accessory if it has not been unlocked and connected to an accessory within the past hour. The feature is seen as an attempt to prevent digital forensics tools like Cellebrite or GrayKey , which are mainly used by law enforcement agencies, from gaining unauthorized entry to a confiscated device and extracting sensitive data. In line with advisories of this k...

Meta-owned WhatsApp on Friday said it disrupted a campaign that involved the use of spyware to target journalists and civil society members. The campaign, which targeted around 90 members, involved the use of spyware from an Israeli company known as Paragon Solutions. The attackers were neutralized in December 2024. In a statement to The Guardian, the encrypted messaging app said it has reached out to affected users, stating it had "high confidence" that the users were targeted and "possibly compromised." It's currently not known who is behind the campaign and for how long it took place. The attack chain is said to be zero-click, meaning the deployment of the spyware occurs without requiring any user interaction. It's suspected to involve the distribution of a specially-crafted PDF file sent to individuals who were added to group chats on WhatsApp. The company noted the targets were spread across over two dozen countries, including several in Europe, ...

A previously undocumented China-aligned advanced persistent threat (APT) group named PlushDaemon has been linked to a supply chain attack targeting a South Korean virtual private network (VPN) provider in 2023, according to new findings from ESET. "The attackers replaced the legitimate installer with one that also deployed the group's signature implant that we have named SlowStepper – a feature-rich backdoor with a toolkit of more than 30 components," ESET researcher Facundo Muñoz said in a technical report shared with The Hacker News. PlushDaemon is assessed to be a China-nexus group that has been operational since at least 2019, targeting individuals and entities in China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea, the United States, and New Zealand. Central to its operations is a bespoke backdoor called SlowStepper, which is described as a large toolkit consisting of around 30 modules, programmed in C++, Python, and Go. Another crucial aspect of its attacks is the hijackin...

A former analyst working for the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) pleaded guilty to transmitting top secret National Defense Information (NDI) to individuals who did not have the necessary authorization to receive it and attempted to cover up the activity. Asif William Rahman, 34, of Vienna, was an employee of the CIA since 2016 and had a Top Secret security clearance with access to Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI). He was charged with two counts of unlawfully transmitting NDI in November 2024 following his arrest in Cambodia. He has pleaded guilty to two counts of willful retention and transmission of classified information related to the national defense. He is expected to be sentenced on May 15, 2025, potentially facing a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison. According to court filings , Rahman is alleged to have retained without authorization two documents classified as Top Secret on or about October 17, 2024, and delivered it to multiple individuals who wer...

Austrian privacy non-profit None of Your Business (noyb) has filed complaints accusing companies like TikTok, AliExpress, SHEIN, Temu, WeChat, and Xiaomi of violating data protection regulations in the European Union by unlawfully transferring users' data to China. The advocacy group is seeking an immediate suspension of such transfers, stating the companies in question cannot shield user data from being potentially accessed by the Chinese government. The complaints have been filed in Austria, Belgium, Greece, Italy, and the Netherlands. "Given that China is an authoritarian surveillance state, it is crystal clear that China doesn't offer the same level of data protection as the E.U.," Kleanthi Sardeli, data protection lawyer at noyb, said . "Transferring Europeans' personal data is clearly unlawful – and must be terminated immediately." Noyb noted that the companies have no choice but to comply with Chinese authorities' requests for access to d...

Russia-linked threat actors have been attributed to an ongoing cyber espionage campaign targeting Kazakhstan as part of the Kremlin's efforts to gather economic and political intelligence in Central Asia. The campaign has been assessed to be the work of an intrusion set dubbed UAC-0063 , which likely shares overlap with APT28, a nation-state group affiliated with Russia's General Staff Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU). It's also known as Blue Athena, BlueDelta, Fancy Bear, Fighting Ursa, Forest Blizzard, FROZENLAKE, Iron Twilight, ITG05, Pawn Storm, Sednit, Sofacy, and TA422. UAC-0063 was first documented by the Computer Emergency Response Team of Ukraine (CERT-UA) in early 2023, detailing its attacks on government entities using malware families tracked as HATVIBE, CHERRYSPY, and STILLARCH (aka DownEx). It's worth pointing out that the use of these malware strains has been exclusive to this group. Subsequent campaigns have been observed setting their sights o...

A Serbian journalist had his phone first unlocked by a Cellebrite tool and subsequently compromised by a previously undocumented spyware codenamed NoviSpy , according to a new report published by Amnesty International. "NoviSpy allows for capturing sensitive personal data from a target's phone after infection and provides the ability to turn on the phone's microphone or camera remotely," the company said in an 87-page technical report. An analysis of forensic evidence points to the spyware installation occurring when the phone belonging to independent journalist Slaviša Milanov was in the hands of the Serbian police during his detention in early 2024. Some of the other targets included youth activist Nikola Ristić, environmental activist Ivan Milosavljević Buki, and an unnamed activist from Krokodil, a Belgrade-based organization promoting dialogue and reconciliation in the Western Balkans. The development marks one of the first known instances where two dispara...

The Russia-linked state-sponsored threat actor tracked as Gamaredon has been attributed to two new Android spyware tools called BoneSpy and PlainGnome , marking the first time the adversary has been discovered using mobile-only malware families in its attack campaigns. "BoneSpy and PlainGnome target former Soviet states and focus on Russian-speaking victims," Lookout said in an analysis. "Both BoneSpy and PlainGnome collect data such as SMS messages, call logs, phone call audio, photos from device cameras, device location, and contact lists." Gamaredon , also called Aqua Blizzard, Armageddon, BlueAlpha, Hive0051, Iron Tilden, Primitive Bear, Shuckworm, Trident Ursa, UAC-0010, UNC530, and Winterflounder, is a hacking group affiliated with Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB). Last week, Recorded Future's Insikt Group revealed the threat actor's use of Cloudflare Tunnels as a tactic to conceal its staging infrastructure hosting malicious payload...