Mexican Attorney General Alejandro Gertz Manero announced Tuesday that he has launched a probe into allegations that former Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto took bribes from Israeli businessmen who allegedly paid him as much as $25 million to secure government contracts for spyware and other technology. The Israeli government has historically been uncooperative with Mexican authorities investigating Pegasus abuses, Gertz Manero said, indicating that his office has requested international legal assistance in order to access the documents TheMarker report draws from. TheMarker’s report is based on documents filed as part of a legal dispute between the businessmen — Uri Ansbacher and Avishai Neriah — who reportedly entered into arbitration in Israeli courts to determine individual proceeds from a joint $25 million “investment” in Peña Nieto. Gertz Manero acknowledged in a press briefing that he currently lacks concrete evidence to prove TheMarker’s claims about Peña Nieto are true, but suggested that the names and documents cited in the news outlet’s report give his office a roadmap for a probe. The arbitration documents allegedly include statements from the businessmen claiming that in exchange for their money, Peña Nietro delivered their “joint business” the lucrative security contracts from the Mexican government, including for the use of Pegasus. In 2021, an international media consortium reporting on NSO abuses — an effort known as the Pegasus Project — revealed that during Peña Nieto's presidency some 15,000 Mexican phone numbers were potentially monitored with Pegasus. Peña Nieto, who served as Mexico’s president from 2012 to 2018, has previously been investigated for other acts of alleged corruption, including incidents involving bribes, but he has never been formally charged. During Peña Nieto’s presidency, digital forensic researchers at the Citizen Lab documented dozens of examples of the use of Pegasus to target phones belonging to journalists, government scientists, politicians and anti-corruption activists. The investigation comes in response to an account in the Israeli business publication TheMarker, which reported that the contracts included a deal to buy Pegasus — the powerful spyware manufactured by Israel-based NSO Group. Gertz Manero said that as part of the investigation his office has sought the documents which allegedly include Neriah and Ansbacher’s account of the alleged bribes.
This Cyber News was published on therecord.media. Publication date: Thu, 10 Jul 2025 19:05:17 +0000