ATHENS – Greece’s intelligence chief has resigned, the government said today amid a scandal over alleged spying of an opposition politician.
Panagiotis Kontoleon “has presented his resignation... which was accepted”, the Prime Minister’s Office said.
The announcement came a week after the leader of the country’s Socialist opposition party filed a complaint with the Supreme Court over “attempted” spying on his mobile phone with Predator malware.
“A few days ago I was informed by the European Parliament that there was an attempt to bug my mobile phone with Predator surveillance software,” Nikos Androulakis told the media as he left the courthouse in Athens on July 26.
The European Parliament set up a special service for Members of the European Parliament to check their phones for illegal surveillance software following hacks using a spyware similar to Predator called Pegasus.
The software can infiltrate mobile phones to extract data or activate a camera or microphone to spy on their owners.
Androulakis used the service for “a precautionary check of his phone on June 28, 2022” and “from the first check, a suspicious link related to the Predator surveillance tool was detected”, his Pasok party said in a statement. – AFP, August 6, 2022
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