Greek political parties have clashed over the affair for years, as an expanding list of cases revealed the highly invasive surveillance tool on the phones of opposition politicians, government ministers, military officials, journalists and business executives. The Greek government has denied using the illegal spyware.
On Thursday, the court found four defendants guilty of “breaching the confidentiality of telephone communications,” “tampering with a personal-data filing system … on a repeated basis,” and “illegal access to an information system or data.”
Those convicted include Tal Dilian, a former Israeli military officer and founder of Intellexa; his business partner Sara Aleksandra Fayssal Hamou; Felix Bitzios, a former deputy administrator and shareholder of Intellexa; and Yiannis Lavranos, whose company Krikel purchased the spyware.
The defendants received combined prison sentences totaling 126 years and eight months, with eight years to be served. All four denied wrongdoing during the trial.
The scandal has cast a long shadow over Greek politics. In 2024, Greece’s Supreme Court cleared the state intelligence service and political officials of wrongdoing, a decision that angered spyware victims and opposition parties.
Androulakis said Thursday that “the fight will continue until all those involved in this murky affair are brought to justice.” He has appealed the Supreme Court’s decision to the European Court of Human Rights.
The opposition party Syriza said in a statement: “The government and Kyriakos Mitsotakis himself can no longer hide. The important thing is that the case is reopening. The investigation into criminal liability and the upgrading of the indictment are starting again.”
The four defendants did not respond to requests for comment.