Meta announced Monday it is filing a federal court contempt order against Israeli spyware firm NSO Group for violating a permanent injunction that barred the company from targeting WhatsApp and its users.
The company's WhatsApp messaging service disrupted new spear phishing attempts linked to NSO, which the U.S. government has blacklisted for activities contrary to national security or foreign policy interests.
These attempts resembled previous "1-click phishing campaigns," designed to trick users into clicking malicious links leading to external websites.
Meta said WhatsApp took down test accounts and groups created by NSO on its platform. NSO did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Last year, a U.S. court ordered NSO to stop targeting WhatsApp, a ruling the spyware company warned could put it out of business. While the court significantly reduced punitive damages NSO owed Meta to $4 million from an initial $167 million, the injunction itself was seen as a major challenge for the company amid ongoing accusations of enabling human rights abuses through its Pegasus hacking tool.
Meta added that last month, 12 prominent civil rights organizations, along with a coalition of security researchers and privacy advocates, filed amicus briefs to fight NSO's appeal against the permanent injunction.