A former member of the European Parliament who served on a committee investigating NSO Group's Pegasus spyware was himself hacked with the same surveillance tool at least three times, according to a new report from Citizen Lab.

Greek investigative journalist Stelios Kouloglou, who served as an MEP from 2015 to 2024, had his iPhone infected with Pegasus spyware in 2022 and 2023 while serving on the European Parliament's PEGA Committee — the very body established to investigate the illegal use of spyware across the European Union.

The three infections occurred while Kouloglou was in Athens and Brussels, Citizen Lab found. He received Apple threat notifications about possible Pegasus breaches, but only months after each intrusion.

"Whichever entity is responsible for the hacking, the infection could have exposed strictly confidential exchanges among PEGA Committee members and their staff, and other sensitive and confidential parliamentary proceedings, including to parties under investigation by the Committee itself," Citizen Lab said in its report.

Citizen Lab did not attribute the hacking to a particular government but said it found no evidence suggesting the Greek government was responsible.

Pegasus, developed by Israel-based NSO Group, allows operators to secretly take control of a target's phone, accessing messages, photos, contacts, camera, and microphone remotely. While NSO markets it for law enforcement use against criminals, it has been repeatedly used to spy on journalists, lawyers, dissidents, and politicians.

German MEP Hannah Neumann, who also served on the PEGA Committee, called for an immediate investigation: "Spyware doesn't make democracies safer. It weakens democratic oversight, parliamentary independence and the rule of law."

Rand Hammoud of the Center for Democracy and Technology Europe described the case as a "broader failure to effectively rein in the commercial spyware market" that should concern "everyone who cares about democracy, fundamental rights, and the rule of law in Europe."

Sources