The Greek intelligence is suspected to be related to cases in which an attempt was made to fish information from the phones of an opposition politician and at least two journalists using spyware.
Head of the Greek Intelligence Service Panagiotis Kontoleon has resigned, says the Greek Prime Minister’s office.
The Greek government said that Kontoleon resigned “as a result of the information revealed in the internal investigation”.
The tangle that led to the separation started when the leader of the Greek opposition party, the social democratic Pasok Nikos Androulakis complained to the Supreme Court that there was an attempt to install spyware on his phone.
In addition to Androulakis, two Greek journalists have said that they were victims of espionage.
Official sources who spoke to the Reuters news agency said that the intelligence chief admitted during an internal audit that the financial reporter Thanasis of Koukak had been bugged.
Reminiscent of the Pegasus spy program
Androulakis, the leader of the Greek Social Democrats, said that he had received information about the spying from the European Union Parliament. According to the investigation, an attempt was made to install Predator spyware on Androulakis’ phone.
Predator can collect passwords, files, photos, web browsing history and contact information from the phone, but the program is less advanced than Pegasus.
The program was originally developed by the North Macedonian start-up company Cytrox in 2017. Cytrox was later bought by Passitora Ltd. from Cyprus. (formerly Wispear). The company is owned by an ex-intelligence officer of the Israeli army Tal Dillian.
Last year Dillian told (you switch to another service)that the company develops so-called Intellexa spy tools intended for use by state law enforcement agencies.
Cyber scientists evaluated (you switch to another service)that Predator has been used at least in Armenia, Egypt, Greece, Indonesia, Madagascar, Oman, Saudi Arabia and Serbia.
The Greek government has denied state involvement in espionage
Greece has said that it does not use spyware and does not cooperate with parties that sell it.
However, Greece recently changed its espionage laws.
In March 2021, a law came into force in Greece that protects intelligence agencies engaged in espionage.
According to the law, authorities that monitor individuals for national security reasons cannot be prosecuted.
In addition, according to the legislation, the security authorities do not have to notify the target after the surveillance has been completed.