Mobile telephones belonging to Finnish diplomats have been spied on utilizing the cyber espionage software program Pegasus, the nation’s international ministry stated on Friday.

“We can now be clear that there has been spyware in our phones,” the ministry’s head of knowledge safety, Matti Parviainen, informed AFP.

The contaminated cell gadgets have been utilized by Finnish diplomats posted abroad, though the ministry refused to touch upon what number of employees have been focused, nor on whether or not the id of the cyberattackers is thought.

“We have good guesses” about how lengthy the diplomats have been spied on, Parviainen stated, however the espionage is not persevering with.

Diplomats’ telephones solely deal with info that’s both public or with the bottom safety classification, the ministry stated, however added “the information and its source may be confidential between diplomats.”

Israeli firm NSO Group, makers of the Pegasus adware, stated it could cooperate in any investigation.

“NSO Group does not know the facts, but can assure that we will be assisting in any investigation on this issue to determine whether a misuse of our products occurred,” the corporate stated in an announcement to AFP.

“If and when a misuse by one of our customers would be found, we will take immediate action, including terminating the customer’s system and contract,” it added.

Pegasus, which might change on a telephone’s digital camera or microphone and harvest its information, was on the centre of a scandal final yr after a listing was made public of about 50,000 potential surveillance targets worldwide, together with journalists, politicians, legal professionals and dissidents.

The NSO Group chairman stepped down on Tuesday however denied the transfer was linked to the controversy across the surveillance software program.

US authorities final November blacklisted NSO by proscribing exports to it from American teams over allegations the agency “enabled foreign governments to conduct transnational repression.”

The NSO Group has beforehand informed AFP that the Pegasus software program is bought “only to legitimate law enforcement agencies who use these systems under warrants to fight criminals, terrorists and corruption.”