On Tuesday, WhatsApp scored a big win against the NSO group when a jury ordered the infamous Spyware manufacturer to pay more than $ 167 million in damage to the owned company.
The ruling ended a legal battle that includes more than five years, which began in October 2019 when WhatsApp accused the NSO group of hacking more than 1,400 of its users taking advantage of a weakness in the audio audio function of the chat app.
The verdict came after a long -term jury trial that presented some evidence, including CEO of NSO Group Yaron See and WhatsApp employees who responded and investigated the incident.
Even before the trial began, the case had revealed several discoveries, including that the NSO group had interrupted 10 of its government clients for its Spyware’s abuse of Pegasus, the locations of 1,223 by the victims of the Spyware campaign, and the names of the Customers of Spyware Manufacturers: Mexico, Saudi Arabia and Uzbekistan.
Techcrunch read the transcripts of the court hearing and is highlighting the most interesting facts and discoveries that came out. We will update this post as we learn more from cache of more than 1,000 pages.
Testimony described how the WhatsApp attack worked
Click Zero attack, which means Spyware did not require interaction from the target, “worked by setting a false WhatsApp on targeted,” as whatsapp lawyer Antonio Perez said during the trial. The lawyer explained that the NSO Group had built what he called the “WhatsApp Installation” server, a special car created to send malicious messages to WhatsApp’s infrastructure imitating real messages.
“Once taken, those messages will cause the user’s phone to reach a third server and download the Spyware Pegasus. The only thing they needed to make it happen was the phone number,” Perez said.
The Vice President of the NSO Group Tamir Gazneli proved that “any solution with zero click whatever is an important milestone for Pegasus.”
NSO Group confirms that it targeted a US phone number as a FBI test
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For years, NSO Group has claimed that its spyware cannot be used against US phone numbers, meaning any cell number starting with country code +1.
In 2022, the New York Times first reported that the company “attacks” a phone in the US but was part of a FBI test.
NSO Group Joe Akrotirianakis confirmed this, saying that “the only exemption” for Pegasus was unable to target +1 numbers “was a specially configured Pegasus version to be used in demonstration for potential US government customers.”
The FBI is said to have chosen not to decide Pegasus after its test.
How do NSO Group Pegasus use the Customers of the Government of NSO
The Director General of NSO See explains that Pegasus’s user interface to its government customers does not offer an opportunity to choose which method or hacking technique to use against the objectives they are interested in, “because customers do not care which vector they use as long as they receive the intelligence they need.”
In other words, it is the Pegasus system in Backend that chooses which hacim technology, known as an exploitation, to use whenever Spyware aims for an individual.
NSO Group headquarters shares the same building as Apple
In a funny coincidence, the NSO Group headquarters in Herzliya, a suburban Tel Aviv in Israel, is in the same building as Apple, whose iPhone customers are also often targeted by the PEGASUS Spyware of NSO. The views said the OSSH occupies the first five floors and Apple occupies the remainder of the 14 -storey building.
“We divide the same elevator when we climb,” the sees said during the testimony.
The fact that the NSO Group headquarters is advertised openly is somewhat interesting in itself. Other companies that develop spyware or zero day as a Barcelona -based dependence, which closed in February, was placed in a cooperation space while claiming on its official website to settle elsewhere.
NSO Group admitted that it continued to target WhatsApp users after the lawsuit was filed
Following Spyware’s attack, WhatsApp filed his lawsuit against the NSO group in November 2019. Despite the active legal challenge, the SPYWARE manufacturer continued to aim for users of the chat app, according to the NSO Group Tamir Gazneli Vice President.
Gazneli said “raised”, the coding name for one of the versions of the WhatsApp Zero-Klik vector, was in use from late 2019 to 2020. Other versions were called “Eden” and “Paradise”, and all three were collectively recognized as “Hummingbird”.
WHO says it hires hundreds of people
The Director General of NSO Group Yaron sees revealed a small but visible detail: NSO Group and its parent company, which have a combined number of employees reaching between 350 and 380. About 50 of these employees work for Cyber.
NSO Group describes heavy finances
During the trial, the views answered questions about the company’s finances, some of which were discovered in the deposits before the trial. These details were brought about as much as the damages the Spyware manufacturer has to pay whatsapp.
According to the views and documents provided by NSO Group, the Spyware manufacturer lost $ 9 million in 2023 and $ 12 million in 2024. The company also revealed it had $ 8.8 million in its bank account since 2023, and $ 5.1 million in the bank since 2024.
It was also found that Q Cyber had about $ 3.2 million in the bank both in 2023 and 2024.
During the trial, NSO discovered its search and development unit – responsible for finding software weaknesses and understanding how to use them – spent about $ 52m on expenses during 2023, and $ 59 million in 2024. See also said that NSO Group customers pay “somewhere in the range of $ 3 and” ten times.
Factoring in these numbers, the Spyware manufacturer was hoping to leave with the payment of little or no damage.
“To be honest, I don’t think we are able to pay anything. We are trying to keep our heads on the water,” the sees said during his testimony. “We are committing to (the main financial officer) just to prioritize the expenses and to make sure we have enough money to meet our commitments, and of course every week.”
Published for the first time on May 10, 2025 and updated with additional details.
