A photograph making the rounds shows former Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto at a wedding celebration alongside Avishai Neriah, identified as a marketer of the Pegasus spyware, the Mexican newspaper La Jornada reported.
Pegasus is powerful surveillance software developed by the Israeli firm NSO Group. Once installed on a target’s phone, it can secretly access messages, calls, photos, and location data without the user’s knowledge. The tool has been at the center of international scandals after investigations revealed it was used by governments around the world to spy on journalists, human rights defenders, and political opponents.
Mexico has been repeatedly linked to Pegasus controversies. During Peña Nieto’s presidency, from 2012 to 2018, journalists and activists reported being targeted with the spyware, allegedly by government agencies that had purchased access to the tool. Those revelations sparked years of investigations and lawsuits, though accountability has been limited.
The new photograph, showing the former president in close proximity to someone connected to the spyware’s commercialization, is likely to renew scrutiny of his administration’s ties to the surveillance industry and reignite questions about who in Mexico’s government approved and used Pegasus against critics.
To see the image and learn more details, check out the full story at La Jornada.
Image: Loco Steve, BY-SA 2.0 (via Openverse).