By Sue-Ann Wayow
OPPOSITION Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar is now questioning if Government is using another spyware called Predator.
According to Persad-Bissessar, “This spyware is sometimes run in parallel with the Pegasus spyware.”
Speaking at the United National Congress (UNC) virtual meeting on Monday night, the Opposition Leader said according to an article published in 2021 by researchers at the University of Toronto – the spyware known as Predator was equally as dangerous as Pegasus. “And it has been used right here in Trinidad and Tobago,” she said.
Based on information from the article, the researchers examined how both Predator and Pegasus together were used to hack into the phones of Egyptian journalists and also found country specific domain names that Predator uses for hacking.
She read, “Of the Shodan and Censys results, we identified several servers that returned HTTP Server headers with the value ‘Server,’ rather than ‘nginx,’ These servers were typically hosted on consumer broadband connections available to local subscribers only, rather than cloud-hosting services that can be procured internationally. We believe that the ‘Server: Server’ IPs on consumer broadband connections are endpoint IPs that indicate locations of customers. We found endpoint IPs in the following countries, these governments are likely among Cytrox’s customers.
“Scanning also reveals a range of domains used by Cytrox that have country-specific themes, which leads us to suspect that they may be specifically targeted in relation to these countries.”
Persad-Bissessar showed a table that showed domains used by Cytrox. Listed in the table were five countries: Madagascar, Mali, Saudi Arabia, Serbia and Trinidad and Tobago.
“I wonder if it’s the Guardian journalists they are spying on?” she asked.
“So Cytrox the company which owns and makes Predator spyware has taken out domain names based in Trinidad and Tobago and is, therefore, are they operating in our country, or is this article a lie?,” Persad-Bissessar said.
She asked, “I am asking the government tonight, how long has Cytrox predator software been used in our country to spy on citizens?”
“Tell us, come forth and you bring the evidence that this article is false,” Persad-Bissessar challenged.
The Opposition Leader added, “And if the government denies using Cytrox Predator spyware, the question then arises as to who is using this in our country.”
Response to Rowley’s statements in Parliament
Persad-Bissessar also said Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley made conflicting statements in Parliament concerning the use of Pegasus software.
“The latest with this saga of the Government’s spying spree is the conflicting statements by the Prime Minister. If nothing else should tell you that they are being untruthful it is the mere fact that the Prime Minister cannot get his story right.”
She spoke about the Communications Act and also said that National Security Minister Fitzgerald Hinds seemed to be unaware of the law.
On Sunday, Hinds, challenged Persad-Bissessar to show evidence that Government was spying on citizens stating she had none.
