{"id":268071,"date":"2026-06-09T04:15:00","date_gmt":"2026-06-09T08:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/06\/09\/whatsapp-discovers-nso-group-linked-spearphishing-attempts\/"},"modified":"2026-06-09T05:15:14","modified_gmt":"2026-06-09T09:15:14","slug":"whatsapp-discovers-nso-group-linked-spearphishing-attempts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/06\/09\/whatsapp-discovers-nso-group-linked-spearphishing-attempts\/","title":{"rendered":"WhatsApp Discovers NSO Group-Linked Spearphishing Attempts"},"content":{"rendered":"

WhatsApp Discovers NSO Group-Linked Spearphishing Attempts<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.infosecurity-magazine.com\/news\/whatsapp-nso-group-spearphishing\/<\/a><\/p>\n

Publish Date: 2026-06-09 04:15:00<\/a><\/p>\n

Source Domain: www.infosecurity-magazine.com<\/a><\/p>\n

WhatsApp has asked a US court to hold a blacklisted spyware firm in contempt, after claiming it has violated a permanent injunction banning it from targeting users.<\/p>\n

The messaging giant said on June 8 that it \u201csuccessfully disrupted\u201d social engineering attempts linked to Israeli firm NSO Group after investigating user complaints.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u00a0tried\u00a0to\u00a0trick\u00a0people\u00a0into\u00a0clicking\u00a0on\u00a0malicious\u00a0links\u00a0to\u00a0drive\u00a0them\u00a0to\u00a0external\u00a0websites\u00a0outside\u00a0of\u00a0WhatsApp,\u00a0similar\u00a0to\u00a0previously\u00a0reported one-click\u00a0phishing\u00a0campaigns\u00a0linked\u00a0to\u00a0NSO,\u201d it said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u00a0also\u00a0caught\u00a0them\u00a0creating\u00a0test\u00a0accounts\u00a0and\u00a0groups\u00a0on\u00a0WhatsApp,\u00a0which\u00a0we\u00a0took\u00a0down.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more on NSO Group: Facebook Takes Spyware Firm NSO Group to Court.<\/p>\n

Last year, the commercial spyware firm was ordered to pay damages of over $167m after hacking into about 1400 WhatsApp users’ devices.<\/p>\n

That ruling was the culmination of a six-year court case which began after Meta engineers detected attempts by NSO to use its spyware tool, Pegasus, to target WhatsApp users including human rights activists, journalists and diplomats.<\/p>\n

The zero-click spyware is often used by repressive regimes to monitor opposition figures and activists. There have\u00a0also been reports\u00a0that the malware was used to hack Amazon boss Jeff Bezos\u2019s phone.<\/p>\n

In 2021, NSO Group was added to the US Commerce Department\u2019s Entity List\u00a0to prevent it from buying components from American companies.<\/p>\n

WhatsApp said the firm should be held in contempt of court to send a clear message.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen\u00a0a\u00a0malicious\u00a0company\u00a0on\u00a0the\u00a0US\u00a0government\u2019s\u00a0Entity\u00a0List\u00a0continues\u00a0to\u00a0defy\u00a0US\u00a0courts,\u00a0existing\u00a0restrictions\u00a0must\u00a0remain\u00a0firmly\u00a0in\u00a0place,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n

\u201cEasing\u00a0them\u00a0would\u00a0undermine\u00a0US\u00a0national\u00a0security\u00a0and\u00a0put\u00a0American\u00a0companies\u00a0and\u00a0billions\u00a0of\u00a0people\u00a0worldwide\u00a0who\u00a0depend\u00a0on\u00a0secure\u00a0communications\u00a0at\u00a0risk.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fighting Back Against Spyware<\/h2>\n

NSO Group remains defiant and is appealing its…<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WhatsApp Discovers NSO Group-Linked Spearphishing Attempts https:\/\/www.infosecurity-magazine.com\/news\/whatsapp-nso-group-spearphishing\/ Publish Date: 2026-06-09 04:15:00 Source Domain: www.infosecurity-magazine.com WhatsApp…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":268072,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/assets.infosecurity-magazine.com\/webpage\/og\/f3978c7e-bac0-424d-8111-e25260505510.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[32,25],"class_list":["post-268071","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cybersecurity","tag-malware","tag-phishing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268071"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=268071"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268071\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":268073,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268071\/revisions\/268073"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/268072"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=268071"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=268071"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=268071"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}