What Is Pegasus Spyware And How Does It Work?

WhatsApp, deemed as the safest option for instant messaging, has been attacked by the Pegasus Israeli spyware. Many famous personalities from all around the world were targeted in the undercover mission. The Israelis have not confirmed the involvement yet but the Pegasus spyware is found to be the culprit. So, let’s find out all about the infamous spyware attack on WhatsApp in this blog post. 

In 2019 the pegasus was found spying on several popular people all around the globe. There has been an inquiry recently over the same and WhatsApp has declared that it has filed a case in Federal Court against it. WhatsApp has confirmed that there was an attack on its US servers and affected at least 1400 users. There have been multiple allegations over the years of phone tapping and snooping using this sophisticated yet highly untraceable spyware tool. Let’s start with finding out what pegasus is and how it infiltrates WhatsApp on the smartphone. 

Must Read: Mobile Phone Security: Causes, Symptoms, Threats, and Solutions

What is Pegasus Spyware?

Pegasus is a spyware developed by NSO which is an Israeli cybersecurity company. The NSO Pegasus is a strongly built spyware that is meant for spying on terrorist organizations and used by Interpol. It can equally be dangerous for Android and iPhone as it can defer the security features. Although NSO has claimed it only sells the spying tool to the Government for safety purposes. 

Pegasus can enter your phone without any notification and then you are directly connected to the hackers who are capable of stealing your information. It is to be noted that this spyware does not require any permissions from your device and still it can easily access all the data. Also once it is installed on your device, it will remain untraceable, and hence removing it is not an easy task. 

The first time Pegasus came to the news was in 2016 when it was installed on an iPhone when the user clicked on the link sent to him on a text message. Only then, it was made clear that it can easily infiltrate the highly secured Apple devices. 

Read more: How To Find Out Who Hacked Your Phone

What happened?

WhatsApp has alleged in the recent case filed in San Francisco that NSO has used Pegasus to spy into the user’s conversations with a hidden agenda. They have informed that the targeted politicians, social workers, journalists, and human rights activists were unknown to the fact of any spyware on their devices. The event took place in April- May 2019 and has affected the people in 20 countries. This was meant to keep an eye on the conversations of the WhatsApp users. It is still unknown what was the real culprit behind it and how much information they have on them. 

Although this has been notified that the Pegasus spyware entered the affected users via a WhatsApp video and voice call. Even if it goes unanswered the spyware can make contact with the device. Thereafter, it makes all the personal information and activities on the device available to the hackers. Since it is a very powerful malware, it is capable of extracting every information on you using your smartphone. This includes contacts, calendar, phone calls, messages, microphone, camera, ID, password, and GPS location. It is also noted that Pegasus is capable of deleting the call logs once it enters your smartphone claiming its complete control on your device.  

Safety measures –

Although there are few things to keep yourself protected from a spyware such as Pegasus as it is very powerful and goes unnoticed. Still, there are a few things to keep in mind for cybersecurity on your smartphone–

• Keep your WhatsApp and other apps up to date.
• Keep updating the Smartphone operating system.
• Install an antimalware application.
• Never share your personal information online.
• Avoid saving the ID and passwords online.
• Do not click on suspicious links and attachments.
• Beware of unknown callers on WhatsApp. 
• Do not hand over your phone to an unknown person.

Also Read: High Alert: Fake Android app Used Netflix’s Brand Name And Sent Whatsapp Messages Automatically

Wrapping up-

The unknown calls and texts land you up in big trouble such as the Pegasus Whatsapp attack. Therefore, it is required for you to keep an eye on the safety of smartphone activities. The big attack has at least made us believe that there are many ways to enter into our personal space via the digital world. It is better to be safe than sorry and be alert of the information we keep on our devices. But all this indicates only one thing which is that there will be more such cyber attacks in the future.

We hope this article will help you learn about the Pegasus hack. We would like to know your views on this post to make it more useful. Your suggestions and comments are welcome in the comment section below. Share the information with your friends and others by sharing the article on social media.

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