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© Copyright LexisNexis 2025. All Rights Reserved.
17 January 2020
Issue: 7870 / Categories: Features , Cyper espionage
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Flavia Kenyon discusses the dangers of cyber espionage & global insecurity
  • An unregulated market lacking legal scrutiny and transparency.
  • The impact of Pegasus: a powerful and pernicious spyware product.
  • Holding spyware companies accountable.

According to Privacy International more than five hundred private companies are currently selling spyware products to governments in a cyber security market expected to be worth $300bn by 2025, a market that is unregulated and lacks legal scrutiny and transparency.

Surveillance of individuals—often journalists, activists, opposition figures, critics, and others exercising their right to freedom of expression—has been shown to lead to arbitrary detention, oppression, sometimes to torture and possibly to extrajudicial killings.

The most powerful and pernicious spyware product on the market today is ‘Pegasus’,developed by Israel’s NSO Group. Earlier this year, UK private equity firm Novalpina Capital acquired majority ownership of the NSO group.

Pegasus

Pegasus penetrates security features in popular operating systems, such as WhatsApp, and silently installs the malware on a target’s phone without the user’s knowledge or permission.

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NEWS
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NLJ this week: Law Society calls for clarity on AML
The government’s plan to introduce a Single Professional Services Supervisor could erode vital legal-sector expertise, warns Mark Evans, president of the Law Society of England and Wales, in NLJ this week
NLJ this week: Turning corporate liability into opportunity
Writing in NLJ this week, Jonathan Fisher KC of Red Lion Chambers argues that the ‘failure to prevent’ model of corporate criminal responsibility—covering bribery, tax evasion, and fraud—should be embraced, not resisted
NLJ this week: A prince no more?
Professor Graham Zellick KC argues in NLJ this week that, despite Buckingham Palace’s statement stripping Andrew Mountbatten Windsor of his styles, titles and honours, he remains legally a duke
NLJ this week: Shareholder secrecy sunk
Writing in NLJ this week, Sophie Ashcroft and Miranda Joseph of Stevens & Bolton dissect the Privy Council’s landmark ruling in Jardine Strategic Ltd v Oasis Investments II Master Fund Ltd (No 2), which abolishes the long-standing 'shareholder rule'
NLJ this week: The expanding remit of national security law
In NLJ this week, Sailesh Mehta and Theo Burges of Red Lion Chambers examine the government’s first-ever 'Afghan leak' super-injunction—used to block reporting of data exposing Afghans who aided UK forces and over 100 British officials. Unlike celebrity privacy cases, this injunction centred on national security. Its use, the authors argue, signals the rise of a vast new body of national security law spanning civil, criminal, and media domains
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