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It’s a lawsuit WhatsApp originally filed in 2019, accusing the Israeli software surveillance firm NSO Group of hacking and spying on more than a thousand WhatsApp users. But while much of the case has remained shrouded in mystery, a new decision from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals allowing the suit to move forward should shed rare light on the secretive spyware group.
The case will now go back to the district court from whence it came and can move to the discovery process, where lawyers for Facebook and WhatsApp—as well as lawyers for NSO Group—can start spilling information about the spying in this case.
In its decision on Monday, the court took particular issue with NSO Group’s unusual argument to avoid scrutiny. NSO Group had said it planned to argue “sovereign immunity” in the case, and therefore couldn’t possibly carry on since, in NSO Group’s reasoning, the fact that the spyware firm sold products to governments should make it immune to facing justice in the United States.
The judge who wrote the opinion declared that NSO Group’s proposed defense was, essentially, hogwash, according to court filings.
“Whatever NSO’s government customers do with its technology and services does not render NSO an agency or instrumentality of a foreign state,’ as Congress has defined that term,” the judge said. “Thus, NSO is not entitled to the...