Vijaita Singh

Surveillance

Vijaita Singh was targeted with Pegasus in 2019. After conducting a remote analysis of the phone, Amnesty International’s Security Lab was able to confirm one attempted infection through an SMS message containing a malicious Pegasus link, in June 2019. It is impossible to know whether the infection was successful.

Who is she?

Vijaita Singh is a national news reporter for The Hindu, where she has covered topics including Kashmir, terrorism and the Maoist activities in central India. Singh’s phone was targeted with Pegasus during the summer of 2019, a time in which she covered a number of high profile terrorism cases and personnel changes within India’s security establishment.

As a female journalist in India, Singh has received systematic online abuse and threats. After receiving a threat online in 2017, she filed a complaint against the internet user, but her concern was met by inaction by the police, according to an article in The Citizen.

Her work

Response

The Indian government has never confirmed or denied being a client of NSO Group. “The allegations regarding government surveillance on specific people has no concrete basis or truth associated with it whatsoever,” a spokesperson for the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology wrote in response to detailed questions sent by Forbidden Stories and its partners. NSO Group did not answer Forbidden Stories’ questions on specific targets but said it “will continue to investigate all credible claims of misuse and take appropriate action based on the results of these investigations.”