A company that makes iPhone hacking software is being sued by Apple

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Remember earlier this year when reports that Pegasus Spyware had been targeting journalists, activists, and other people of interest via their iPhones? Well, Apple fixed the exploit that enabled it, and now they’re suing the company behind the spyware, the NSO Group.

That’s bad news for the NSO Group, which was recently put on the blacklist by the Biden administration for acting “contrary to the foreign policy and national security interests of the US.” In addition, the lawsuit from Apple seeks a permanent injunction against the NSO Group and their parent company from using any Apple product or service in the future.

Apple filed the lawsuit in a federal court in California, and aims to “hold [the NSO Group] accountable for the surveillance and targeting of Apple users.” The lawsuit also asks for damages, for the NSO Group’s alleged “flagrant violations of U.S. federal and state law.”

READ MORE: Apple and Meta handed over data to hackers pretending to be police

That would make things more difficult for the Israeli spyware company to develop new attacks against Apple’s devices, although it possibly wouldn’t completely stop them.

READ MORE: Apple’s new Lockdown Mode protects your iPhone from hackers

I mean, they’ve been selling their spyware tools to authoritarian governments like Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Rwanda, and Mexico, none of which have a great track record when it comes to tracking their citizens, or those of other countries.

It wouldn’t be a great leap of logic to infer that all an injunction would do is give the NSO Group more legal ammo the next time they were caught.

The NSO Group provided The Guardian a statement, which reads “Thousands of lives were saved around the world thanks to NSO Group’s technologies used by its customers. Pedophiles and terrorists can freely operate in technological safe-havens, and we provide governments the lawful tools to fight it. NSO group will continue to advocate for the truth.”

READ MORE: Apple is facing a class-action lawsuit after cracked Apple Watch screens injured users

Apple isn’t the only company with pending litigation against the NSO Group over its creation of the Pegasus spyware. WhatsApp is also suing over the alleged targeting of its own servers in California, which gave customers of the NSO Group access to roughly 1,400 mobile devices, in violation of U.S. federal and state law.

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Joe Rice-Jones

Maker, meme-r, and unabashed geek with nearly half a decade of blogging experience at KnowTechie, SlashGear and XDA Developers. If it runs on electricity (or even if it doesn't), Joe probably has one around his office somewhere, with particular focus in gadgetry and handheld gaming. Shoot him an email at joe@knowtechie.com.