An unlikely cast of characters including a Hollywood producer and the heir to the Wrigley chewing gum fortune are exploring a possible bid to take control of assets owned by NSO Group, the Israeli company behind one of the world’s most sophisticated cyber-weapons.
Robert Simonds, a US financier whose credits include producing several Adam Sandler films, has been engaged in talks to acquire the blacklisted spyware company’s assets, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter.
A firm owned by Simonds’s friend, William “Beau” Wrigley – who was an heir to his family’s chewing gum fortune and has since become involved in the cannabis industry – has conducted due diligence in connection to a possible NSO deal, according to a document seen by the Guardian.
NSO, which is closely regulated by Israel’s ministry of defence, sells its spyware to government clients around the world. It has faced intense scrutiny in the US, where the Biden administration in 2021 took the extraordinary step of placing the company on a blacklist and accused it of selling software tools that “enabled foreign governments to conduct transnational repression”.
NSO has said it sells its spyware tool – called Pegasus – to government clients for use in fighting serious crime, like terrorism, and that it investigates credible allegations of abuse.
A spokesperson for NSO said she was “not aware” of Simonds’s plans.
Experts have speculated about NSO’s future since it was added to the US blacklist, which bars the transfer of US technology to the company without a special licence. NSO is also being sued by Apple and Facebook in the US because of allegations that it has targeted the two companies’ users. NSO has argued that its government clients – not NSO itself – controls its hacking tools.
The Guardian reported in March that one of the company’s original founders – Omri Lavie – emerged as NSO’s new majority owner following a protracted legal fight over the group’s future. Simonds then joined the board of Lavie’s Luxembourg-based company, called Dufresne, shortly thereafter with the support of the company’s remaining debt holders. One possible option being mulled by Simonds, sources suggest, would involve buying out remaining debt holders and other creditors and stripping assets like Pegasus – NSO’s key hacking tool – out of NSO and transferring it into a new company.
One person close to Simonds said the investor was “deep” in deliberations over a possible takeover of NSO’s assets but had not yet made up his mind about how to proceed because of several “hurdles” facing any potential deal.
Those obstacles include possible resistance by Israeli authorities to any sale of the regulated entity’s assets. The US government would not have a formal say in any deal.
The US defence contractor L3Harris engaged in talks last year about a possible takeover of NSO’s surveillance technology, in a deal that would have given an American company control over one of the world’s most sophisticated hacking tools. But White House resistance to the deal ultimately disrupted the talks, after a Biden administration official noted that any such transaction by a major US contractor would raise “serious counter-intelligence and security concerns”.
The person close to Simonds said the executive was considering an imminent resignation from the Dufresne board, and was mulling options including legal action in Israel that could potentially pave the way for a sale of NSO’s assets. The person said Simonds had lined up potential investors to finance the possible acquisition of NSO’s assets.
Simonds did not respond to the Guardian’s request for comment.
After the Guardian published its story, a spokesperson for Wrigley said in a statement: “Mr Wrigley evaluates many opportunities, all of which are strictly confidential. Mr Wrigley is not pursuing an investment in NSO.”
Simonds is not a known figure in the cyber industry. The US executive founded and previously served as the chairman of STX Entertainment and is known to have historically courted investors from China and India, as well as having a business dealings in Saudi Arabia.
It is far from clear whether Simonds would be able to complete any deal to take over NSO assets but people familiar with his plans say he has privately discussed trying to put NSO’s sought-after technology exclusively in the hands of “Five Eyes”, the intelligence alliance that includes the US, the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
