"We welcome an investigation into this affair so we can clear our name," Shalev Hulio, co-founder and CEO of the NSO Group – an Israeli technology firm that has been making headlines over the past week for all the wrong reasons – told Israel Hayom Wednesday.
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In a special interview that will be published on Friday, Hulio speaks of the reports alleging the company's "Pegasus" spyware was used by governments worldwide to spy on a long list of political rivals, journalists, and human rights activists by hacking their mobile phones.
"We do not now nor have we ever had any connection to the list [featured in some reports] and if it turns out a client abused our system to spy on journalists or human rights activists – they will be disconnected immediately. We have proven this in the past, including when it came to major clients with whom we severed ties," he asserted.
Hulio believes the NSO Group is the subject of an organized campaign.
"It looks like someone decided to go after us," he told Israel Hayom. This story is not for nothing. Israeli cyber is being targeted in general – there are so many cyber intelligence companies in the world, but the focus is solely on the Israeli ones.
"To come up with such a consortium of journalists from all over the world and then include Amnesty [officials] – it looks like it has a guiding hand."
Q: By who?
"I believe that it's either Qatar or BDS, or both. It always ends up being the same entities," he said, speculating that the Gulf state or the anti-Israel boycott, divestment and sanctions movement could be involved in trying to discredit NSO.
"I don't want to sound cynical, but there are people who don't want ice cream imported [to Israel] or to see our technologies exported. I don't think it's a coincidence that in the same week they are trying to prevent Cellebrite from having its IPO, and reports come out about Candiru and Quadream, and then us," he continued, naming an Israeli digital intelligence company set to go public on Nasdaq and two Israeli companies that have also been accused of allegedly allowing clients to use their spyware to hack mobile phones of dissidents, journalists and human rights activists.
"It just doesn't make sense that it's all just a big coincidence that everything is happening at the same time."
Q: If the software is not being abused, as you claim, why not allow access to it? Show everyone all is on the up and up?
"Because there are matters of confidentiality at play, as well as matters of national security and commercial agreements with respect to the countries we work with. I can't just come out and say 'we did this and we didn't do that.' But any state agency – any agency, from any state – can come and I will allow access. Let them dig through it top to bottom. Let them."
While speaking with Israel Hayom, Hulio volunteers to cooperate with any investigation by any authorized entity.
He says that the NSO Group checks any information that comes its way and suggests "Pegasus" is being misuses and so far, it has refuted the allegations made in recent days in the context of hacking into the phones of the French President Emmanuel Macron, the Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo, King Mohammed VI of Morocco and French journalists.
"We select our clients carefully and we make strike airtight agreements with them that allow us to terminate the service if it is found that the system is misused. We disconnected the system for five clients in recent years."
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Julio defines "Pegasus" as "life-saving software," arguing that in a world with end-to-end call encryption there is currently no other viable alternative with which to fight against serious crime and terrorism.
He rejects claims that the company's sole motive is financial, saying that NSO has refused to sell its "Pegasus" spyware to 90 countries around the world over concerns they would abuse it.
The full interview will be featured in Friday's edition of Israel Hayom.
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