If only foreigners could be gagged like Indians.

"Spyware Pegasus, which is sold by the NSO Group of Israel, may have been used to conduct surveillance on about 300 Indians, including two serving Cabinet ministers at the Centre, three opposition leaders, a Constitutional authority, government officials, scientists and about 40 journalists, according to French media non-profit, Forbidden Stories, and Amnesty International," Times of India (TOI). "NSO describes its customers as 60 intelligence, military and law enforcement agencies in 40 countries, the report said." "One of the worrying aspects of the Pegasus spyware is how it has evolved from its earlier spear-phishing methods using text links or messages to 'zero-click' attacks which do not require any action from the phone's user," The Indian Express (TIE). "The Guardian quoted Claudio Guarnieri, who runs Amnesty International's Berlin based Security Lab, as saying that once a phone was infiltrated, Pegasus had 'more control' over it than the owner." "Kaspersky security researchers stated in their analysis of the spyware, 'Another interesting fact about Pegasus is that it tries to hide itself really diligently. The malware self-destructs if it's not able to communicate with its command-and-control(C&C) server for more than 60 days, or if it detects that it was installed on the wrong device with the wrong SIM card (remember, this is targeted spying; NSO's clients weren't going after random victims)," CNBC. "Amnesty's Security Lab examined 67 smartphones where attacks were suspected. Of these, 23 were successfully infected and 14 showed signs of attempted penetration," The Wire. "Three Android phones, including a device belonging to The Hindu reporter Vijaita Singh, showed signs of targeting, such as Pegasus-linked SMS messages." "A majority of the numbers identified in the list were geographically concentrated in 10 country clusters: India, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Morocco, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates," The Wire. Of those whose names are on the list, "Sixteen activists, lawyers and academics from across India have been arrested" in the Elgar Parishad case and "nearly a dozen more numbers belonging to close relatives, friends, lawyers and colleagues of those arrested also appear to have been of interest", The Wire. "Activist Rona Wilson's computer was compromised for over 22 months before the Pune Police raided his home in New Delhi and arrested him as co-accused in Bhima-Koregaon violence, claimed the Massachusetts-based digital forensics firm Arsenal Digital," The Tribune. "The firm said it connected the same attacker to a significant malware infrastructure which has been deployed over the course of approximately four years to not only attack Wilson's computer for 22 months, but to attack his co-defendants in the Bhima Koregaon case and defendants in other high-profile Indian cases as well." Evidence was also planted on lawyer Surendra Gadling's computer in the same case. "The Washington Post on Tuesday published an article on the report of a US based data forensics firm that found that Nagpur lawyer Surendra Gadling's computer had been hacked with the NetWire malware in 2016 via email and a total of 14 documents had been planted between December 4, 2016, and October 22, 2017," The Telegraph. Journalists at investigative news magazine Caravan have been attacked by governments and their goons. "Ten sedition cases have been brought against three of its senior-most editorial staff -- the publisher, editor and executive editor -- for a story and tweets relating to the death of the protester (at farmers' rally)," BBC. "Last year, four of Caravan's journalists were attacked in two separate incidents while reporting on the aftermath of religious riots and a protest concerning the alleged rape and murder of a teenager in Delhi." The Delhi Police did not file chargesheet against Greta Thunberg and Rihanna regarding their tweets supporting protesting farmers but they did file charges against unknown people. Chief Justice of India NV Ramana recently said that holding elections is no "guarantee against tyranny of the elected," TOI. Indians are helpless against a tyrannical government but foreigners are not afraid to list Prime Minister Narendra Modi among the "predators of press freedom", The Wire. If only foreigners could be arrested on false charges and beaten up. At least Indians are fair game.