Politics: Pegasus scandal reveals massive espionage in Mexico with no legislative control

MEXICO - Report 27 Jul 2021 by Guillermo Valdes and Francisco González

Worldwide, Mexico is the country with the highest level of espionage with Pegasus spyware. The international scandal that broke this past week therefore has had major repercussions in the country since a whopping 30% of all the intercepted communications worldwide -15,000 telephones- correspond to Mexico.

The targets of the surveillance were journalists, human rights activists, and opposition politicians. The espionage and spyware revelations were coupled with reports on the use of front companies for multi-million dollar purchases of the Pegasus spyware developed by the Israeli SGO group. Suspicions of overbilling and corruption immediately followed the initial reports.

During the Peña Nieto administration, private telephones were tapped by the Center for Research and National Security (Cisen), the Federal Attorney General’s Office, the Federal Police, and even the Army and the Navy and some state attorney general's offices. This was largely possible due to the lack of controls by the legislative and judicial branches over the agencies legally empowered to engage in such surveillance.

The existing National Security Law, dating from 2005, was and is insufficient to provide the necessary oversight to halt practices that clearly undermine democracy and the rule of law. The legislation does contemplate the existence of a bicameral commission that in theory supervises the Cisen and its newest incarnation known as the National Intelligence Center (CNI), but not the army or the Federal Attorney General’s Office. Moreover, this body has no powers to demand accountability on the use of technological spying tools.

In light of the new evidence and the corresponding public outcry, the Financial Investigation Unit (UIF) of the Ministry of Finance is investigating the scope of the espionage operations and use of Pegasus spyware.

However, the information provided by the UIF generally corresponds to the practice of the current government of using the media to expose only probable instances of corruption committed by the so called neoliberal governments in the past. There seems to be no intention of setting a precedent to punish espionage practices.

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