By Ioanna Mandrou

The existence and action of an extensive network of telephone monitoring of various persons, politicians, journalists and others through the malicious software Predator, is recognized in his multi-page conclusion by the deputy prosecutor of the Supreme Court, Achilleas Zisis, who conducted the relevant investigation for nine months.

The prosecutor’s conclusion, which even before it was announced has provoked strong reactions and severe political criticism, directs all the criminal responsibility for the wiretapping to four individuals, legal representatives and owners of the companies that were involved, in one way or another, in the action with the Predator software in our country.

These are Ioannis Lavranos, Felix Biggio, Sara Aleksandra Hamu, Tal Jonathan Dilian, for whom the prosecutor charges criminal responsibilities for violations of the legislation on telephone privacy and personal data.

For all four, as the case may be, in detail, the conclusion states in detail what they did in acts of violation of telephone privacy in 116 casespoliticians, journalists, etc., in order to have access to their communications, of any type, telephone, electronic, etc.

According to the prosecutor in two cases, the journalist Thanasis Koukakis and Artemis Sifford, they achieved their goal, as both opened the malicious software and were monitored, while for the other 114, including PASOK president Nikos Androulakis, according to the conclusion, they were victims of an attempt to monitor as they did not click on the relevant links.

However, victims’ advocates claim that there are others who “clicked” on the relevant link and suffered surveillance, including the former minister, who has filed a relevant complaint, Christos Spirtzis.

The deputy prosecutor of the Supreme Court is limited only to those -victims of the surveillance- who appealed to the courts (Koukakis, Androulakis, Spirtzis and others) and does not refer to other political figures who were targets, without however appealing to justice.

Also, in the 286-page report, no responsibility is attributed to the National Intelligence Service (NIS) or the Counter-Terrorism Service.
But from the expert opinion he carried out at the Ministry of Internal Affairs together with two experts, it emerged (there is a special reference in the prosecutor’s opinion) that 28 targets, victims of surveillance with the Predator, they had been monitored from time to time by the EYP.

According to the conclusion, this percentage, 24% of all identified victims of the Predator, (a total of 116) does not lead, according to the prosecutor, to a conclusion that there was a joint EYP-Predator monitoring center, while the deputy prosecutor Achilleas Zisis advances a step up. It drops the proportion of those who had dual monitoring, EYP and Predator to 1%, when comparing the 28 EYP targets that were also Predator targets, to the total of 15 thousand phone privacy removal orders that took place from 2020 to 2023.

So, disconnects EYP from illegal surveillance noting that there is no other element, apart from the double monitoring, which, according to him, supports the foundation of the complaints about a joint monitoring center ending in Megaros Maximos.

Only for misdemeanors

And while the multi-page conclusion does not assign responsibilities to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, for the operation of which in relation to the monitoring of persons, it understands in detail how the procedure is carried out and what is provided by law, it also does not assign responsibilities to persons who were reported for the wiretapping, including the then commander of the EYP Panagiotis Kontoleon and the then general director of the Prime Minister’s office (General Secretary) Grigoris Dimitriadis, as well as the then prosecutor responsible for the EYP issue Vasiliki Vlachou, who had signed and exercised the legality check for thousands of surveillances.

particularly for the then commander of the EYP Panagiotis Kontoleontas in the conclusion it is stated, that had no knowledge of illegal surveillancethe same and for Grigoris Dimitriadisfor which it is stated, that he never had relevant information or any knowledge.

In terms the prosecutor Vasiliki Vlachou it is emphasized that she was subject to disciplinary control by the Supreme Court and no criminal liability was attributed to her.

In any case, the result will be studied by the victims, the political parties and everyone interested in order for there to be moves – some of which have already been announced – such as an appeal to the European Court or other political moves at the parliamentary level that will be escalated when the Parliament opens.

However, advocates of the victims of wiretapping already point out that there is no foundation in the conclusion as to why the surveillance was carried out by private individuals, who were the moral perpetrators of these illegal actions and why, despite the fact that the conclusion recognizes the illegal action of the because of four people, they are only held responsible for misdemeanors and not for example felonies, criminal organization or even espionage. Also, advocates of victims note that for the violation of personal data, the charge could be a felony rather than a misdemeanorwhile declaring that they will take legal action in order to reveal the truth.

Detailed excerpts from the finding

For Grigoris Dimitriadis: He was appointed Secretary General of the Prime Minister in July 2019 and subsequently, with the Prime Minister’s Decision No. 344 (Government Gazette B’ 2659/18.06.2021), he is authorized to sign documents “By order of the Prime Minister”, acts and decisions concerning, among others, procedural issues of the Coordination Council for Information Management of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. etc. He was never informed by the Commander or anyone else about any person’s connections, nor in general he had no information about the issuance of Prosecutor’s Orders of legal attachmentfor which persons the provisions concern, their time periods, the reasons for their issuance and in general for the entire procedure that precedes the issuance of a prosecutor’s order.

The conclusions: 1. Felix Bitzios, 2. Sara Aleksandra Hamon, 3. Tai Jonathan Dilian, 4. Ioannis Lavranos with the above qualities, on the one hand attempted without their relative right, i.e. without the express consent of the legal beneficiary and in violation of the protection measure to gain access to part or all of the information system or electronic data of the victims within the meaning of article 13 par. f and g PC, and on the other hand, in two other cases they attempted without their relative right and in violation of the protection measure they gained access to part or all of the information system or electronic data of the victims.

Specifically, in two cases they installed telephone numbers (of Artemis Sifford and Athanasiou Koukakis) andattempted to install Predator spyware on another 114 phone numbers, belonging to various subscribers, natural and legal persons, including the plaintiffs Nikolaos Androulakis, Christos Spirtzis, Maria Sakali Zoi, Roussou Angeliki, Panagiotis Zarkadas and Ioannis Anastasakos, with the aim of gaining access to part or all of the information system or in electronic data of the victims in the above sense, and the installation of the above spying software is done by sending an sms (or another message, e.g. via applications) to the mobile phone numbers of the recipients which does not necessarily require direct contact of the medium with the connection or device, in the most specific way mentioned in sub. item Class A. In this case, the links received and opened by Artemis Sifford and Athanasios Koukakis were respectively “emvolio-gov.gr” and “blogspot.edolio.com”, while the other message recipients did not open the links they received. With this act, the defendants obtained, without the express consent of the legal beneficiaries, access to part or all of the information system or electronic data of the victims Artemis Sifford and Athanasiou Koukakis, ewhereas in the other 114 cases they attempted to gain access to part or all of the information system or in electronic data of the victims, but in the latter case their crime was not completed for reasons independent of their will, in view of the fact that the other recipients – except for the above two – did not open the links they received.