Phones of People in Armenia Infected and Spied On, Martirosyan Comments

Yesterday, a list of countries that use software to infect and spy on people’s phones domestically was published, with Armenia included in that list. Information security expert Samvel Martirosyan discussed this with ArmDaily.am.

The investigation conducted by Meta-Facebook and Citizen Lab found that the targets are political figures and individuals associated with the media. The Cytrox spyware was used.

“This is an organization that provides surveillance software to law enforcement agencies, meaning it sells viruses to states for espionage purposes, to catch and track criminals and terrorists. However, their investigation has indicated that these programs are often used not as stated, but against journalists and political figures,” said Martirosyan.

It is worth mentioning that weeks ago it became known that Armenia had acquired the Pegasus spyware, which conducts illegal wiretappings on Apple devices. Martirosyan stated that this case can be considered a continuation of the Pegasus incident. “This program is Macedonian and has Israeli connections,” said Martirosyan.

When asked if there had been recorded instances of wiretapping and spying in Armenia before, Martirosyan replied, “The Pegasus case. This is simply the first case where Armenia is mentioned as a potential buyer of that program. When discussions were about infections from that program, it was not obvious that it could be internal because the infection could have come from Azerbaijan or Turkey.”

Regarding securing oneself from the program, Martirosyan emphasized that not everyone can be targeted by this program. “Such programs are usually expensive, and there is no generalized ‘what to do’ question. This is about individuals who are really interesting and worth spending large sums of money on: editors, media owners, investigative journalists, political figures,” Martirosyan stated.

According to the study, clients of the program have been identified in Egypt, Armenia, Greece, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Colombia, Côte d'Ivoire, Vietnam, the Philippines, and Germany.