Serbia’s Spyware Abuse Escalates as Students Targeted in Election Run-Up

As Serbia heads towards a snap parliamentary election, members of the country’s student-led protest movement and opposition politicians challenging the government of President Aleksandar Vucic have been targeted with some of the world’s most intrusive surveillance tools. At least 14 people have been targeted with sophisticated spyware since the beginning of 2026, according to the Belgrade-based digital rights organisation SHARE Foundation, which described the cases as the largest documented wave of spyware targeting in Serbia to date. The targeting happened around tightly-contested local elections in March, and those affected included student activists, an opposition MP and a local councillor. The investigation began after 12 people contacted SHARE in August after receiving Apple notifications warnings that they had been targeted with mercenary spyware. Less than two years after the Serbian authorities’ use of domestically-developed spyware NoviSpy was exposed, SHARE researchers in collaboration with the Citizen Lab and Amnesty International found a newly engineered version on students’ phones, alongside the first confirmed successful infection of a member of Serbia’s student protest movement by Pegasus spyware. Investigators found evidence of a zero-click iMessage attack dating from December 2025 and January 2026, pointing to the highly intrusive Pegasus malware produced by Israel’s NSO Group. Such an infection can give an attacker access to messages, photographs and other data, as well as the ability to activate a phone’s microphone and camera covertly. Subscribe to Balkan Insight Premium to read the full article. Please login to your account below if you are already a Premium Subscriber. Buy Premium Subscription Our Premium Service gives you full access to all content published on BalkanInsight.com, including analyses, investigations, comments, interviews and more. Choose your subscription today and get unparalleled in-depth coverage of the Southern and Eastern Europe. Buy Premium Subscription If you have trouble logging in or any other questions regarding you account, please contact us