According to an investigation published Sunday in the British daily The Sunday Times, journalists, lawyers, or even the former boss of European football Michel Platini as well as a French senator, Nathalie Goulet, were the targets of hackers hired to protect the reputation of the Qatar.
These personalities have most often been targeted for their work or critical positions on the awarding and organization of the Football World Cup, which kicks off on November 20.
Towards a boycotted World Cup?
Qatar is implicated for the treatment of workers on construction sites linked to the competition, respect for the rights of women and LGBT people, or even the possible use of air conditioning in the stadiums where the matches will be played.
Calls for a boycott of the competition have multiplied, without meeting massive echoes so far, for an event followed every four years by billions of people around the world.
In France, five major cities including Paris have given up installing giant screens and fan zones to broadcast matches during the competition.
Personalities spied on
Among the personalities targeted by the group of hackers based in India are in particular journalists, like that of the Sunday Times Jonathan Calvert, who had investigated the alleged maneuvers of corruption which led to the attribution of the test in Qatar in 2010 .
Also spied on were French senator Nathalie Goulet, who had accused Qatar of financing “Islamic terrorism”, and American-Hungarian lawyer Mark Somos, who filed a complaint against the ruling family of Qatar before the High Council of Nations. united for human rights.
“Deeply shocked”
The former president of UEFA, Michel Platini, yet a great defender of Qatar’s candidacy to organize the World Cup, would also have been targeted. This would have happened shortly before he was heard by French justice as part of an investigation into suspicions of corruption in the awarding of the World Cup to the gas emirate.
In reaction to the assertions of the English newspaper, Michel Platini said he was “surprised and deeply shocked”, in a press release sent to AFP.
The former captain of the France team is studying “all the legal follow-up he is determined to give – if the information from the Sunday Times is correct – to what appears to be a manifest and villainous violation of his private life”, is it specified.
Qatar denies
“The investigation clearly indicates that the client (of the hackers) is the host of the next World Cup: Qatar”, write the journalists. The use of the Indian group of hackers would have been made through former British police or intelligence officers.
In a statement sent to AFP, a Qatari official denounced “manifestly false and baseless” allegations, which are based “on a single source who claims that his client was Qatar, without providing the slightest proof”.
Beyond Qatar, the Sunday Times investigation reveals many other cases of hacking of personalities carried out by the same Indian group, on behalf of English law firms and autocratic regimes.