Internal docs and court records: FBI made a push in late 2020 and H1 2021 to deploy Pegasus in criminal investigations, before dropping the plans in July 2021
Christopher Wray, the F.B.I.'s director, told Congress last December that the bureau purchased the phone hacking tool Pegasus for research purposes. Tweets: @ronenbergman , @amypeikoff , @hatr , @llchristyll , @alanvrk , @snlyngaas , @justinhendrix , and @zackwhittaker Tweets: Ronen Bergman / @ronenbergman : During a closed-door congressional session FBI director Wray said the bureau bought the cyber weapon Pegasus but only for research and development. However, dozens of internal F.B.I. documents and court records tell a different story. W\@MarkMazzettiNYT https://www.nytimes.com/... Amy Peikoff / @amypeikoff : “After testing and evaluation, the F.B.I. chose not to use the product operationally in any investigation.” Why do I have the feeling that those last 4 words were carefully chosen? 🙄 #privacy https://www.nytimes.com/... Hakan / @hatr : „The specifics of why the bureau chose not to use Pegasus remain a mystery, but American officials have said that it was in large part because of mounting negative publicity about how the tool had been used" https://www.nytimes.com/... Christy Thornton / @llchristyll : I'm sorry, but does anyone believe the FBI assertion that they didn't actually use Pegasus once they bought it? “The specifics of why the bureau chose not to use Pegasus remain a mystery,” uh huh. https://www.nytimes.com/... Alan Stacey / @alanvrk : Interesting story. The author seems not to have considered the possibility that the reason the FBI did not “use the product operationally in any investigation” after buying a license for “research and development” is that they now have their own bird.😎 https://www.nytimes.com/... Sean Lyngaas / @snlyngaas : The FBI drew up guidelines for using NSO Group's Pegasus in criminal investigations, despite Chris Wray's public insistence that it was only used for research, @MarkMazzettiNYT & @ronenbergman report. https://www.nytimes.com/... Justin Hendrix / @justinhendrix : “The F.B.I. also owes Americans a clear explanation as to whether the future operational use of NSO tools is still on the table.” -Sen. @RonWyden https://www.nytimes.com/... Zack Whittaker / @zackwhittaker : In Sept-Oct 2020, after the FBI had tested Pegasus, FBI officials put together PowerPoint presentations that included “detailed discussions of the potential risks or advantages of using the NSO tool.” https://www.nytimes.com/...
Context & Ripple Effects
The New York Times' January investigation into NSO's Pegasus established that the FBI had purchased the spyware but claimed it went unused; today's follow-up, built on internal documents and court records, rewrites that picture — the bureau actively planned operational deployments in criminal cases through late 2020 and the first half of 2021 before shelving them in July 2021.
The gap matters because Director Christopher Wray testified to Congress last December that the purchase was for research and development only, and Sen. Ron Wyden has now formally demanded an explanation of whether operational use of NSO tools remains on the table. The disclosure lands while Washington maintains sanctions on NSO itself.
First-order effects
- Wray's 'research purposes' account to Congress now conflicts directly with the documented deployment planning, putting the FBI on the defensive in closed-door oversight sessions and forcing a response to Wyden's demand for clarification.
- NSO Group's standing in Washington worsens further: the record shows its flagship product was one signature away from routine use inside American criminal investigations, deepening the reputational case behind the existing US sanctions.
Second-order effects
- Other agencies' behavior undercuts the sanctions narrative — the related reporting on the DEA's secret deployment of Graphite spyware shows federal buyers still acquiring foreign surveillance tools despite the NSO penalties, inviting Congress to scrutinize procurement across agencies rather than at one vendor.
- Commercial spyware vendors reading the file will treat US law enforcement as a proven, near-realized market, sustaining the sales pipeline that Mexico's experience as Pegasus' first and most prolific client demonstrates can persist long after public promises to stop.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, the structural issue is not any single agency but a two-track US posture: sanctioning commercial spyware abroad while domestic agencies quietly buy and test the same class of tools — a contradiction likely to push toward formal congressional rules governing which agencies may acquire offensive phone-hacking capability and under what authorization.
- The episode also sets a precedent for oversight mechanics: internal documents and court records, rather than official testimony, are becoming the decisive evidence in policing the gap between what intelligence and law-enforcement leaders tell Congress and what they procure.
The trend: US law enforcement is moving from evaluating commercial phone-hacking tools toward operational dependence on them, even as Washington sanctions the vendors selling them.