New Delhi: Import documents show that the Intelligence Bureau (IB), India’s domestic intelligence agency, bought hardware from the Israeli company NSO Group that matches the description of equipment used to deploy the Pegasus spyware, according to a report by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP).
Though the report – by Sharad Vyas and Jurre van Bergen of the OCCRP –says “it is not possible to say conclusively whether the imported hardware was used for Pegasus”, it follows the claim reported by the New York Times earlier this year that the Indian government purchased Pegasus spyware in 2017 as part of a major arms deal with Israel.
Pegasus is military-grade spyware through which the user – who must be a government entity under Israel’s export law – gains complete access to a person’s mobile phone. Though the company claims that the spyware is used to target criminal and terror gangs, the Pegasus Project – an international consortium of media organisations – demonstrated in July 2021 that it was used to target journalists, activists and opposition politicians.
According to OCCRP, import data shows that on April 18, 2017, the IB received a shipment of hardware from NSO “matching the description of equipment used elsewhere to run Pegasus software”. The shipment came by air and was unloaded in Delhi. OCCRP says it accessed the data through a subscription-based trade website that has import and export details on commercial shipments worldwide.
“The consignment included Dell computer servers, Cisco network equipment, and ‘uninterruptible power supply’ batteries, which provide power in case of outages, according to a bill of lading obtained through a global trade data platform that draws on national customs documents,” the report says.
The shipment equipment cost $315,000 (or just over Rs 2 crore at that time), was delivered by air and was marked “for Defence and Military Use”, OCCRP says.
Consignment showing NSO shipped equipment to Intelligence Bureau in April 2017. Photo: By Arrangement
“That description — and the timing of the shipment — appeared to match the account given in January by the New York Times, which reported that Pegasus and a missile system had been ‘centerpieces’ of a major 2017 arms deal between Israel and India,” it adds.
Though it is not possible to say “conclusively” whether the hardware was used for Pegasus, OCCRP said that the specifications resemble those laid out in a brochure for Pegasus spyware submitted to a US court in a lawsuit filed against NSO Group by Meta in 2019. The report adds that similar equipment was shipped to Mexico and Ghana, two other customers of NSO Group.
OCCRP said that two intelligence officials, “a senior officer and a contractor”, confirmed on the condition of anonymity that Pegasus had been purchased by the Indian government in 2017.
OCCRP said that neither the NSO Group nor the IB responded to questions it sent about the shipments.
In the aftermath of the revelations made by the Pegasus Project, the Indian government neither denied nor confirmed that it had purchased Pegasus. The Supreme Court constituted a committee to probe the alleged misuse of the spyware, which said in August this year that though it had found malware on some phones it had inspected, it could not confirm if it was Pegasus. The committee also said that the government refused to cooperate with the probe.