Did Pegasus spyware infect your device? Now find out for free

Pegasus, the surveillance tool used to spy on citizens by infecting their phones with spyware, has grabbed the world's attention since Sunday when reports emerged about people being targeted using the software. The Pegasus spyware, developed by NSO Group is in the mid of a huge controversy for targeting iOS and Android smartphone users. Pegasus software is able to access vast amounts of information from a user and monitor them at will, even without the user got a doubt about it.

Now, a tool is available that can tell smartphone users whether their device got infected by the dangerous Pegasus spyware. TechCrunch has reported that the researchers at Amnesty International have published a tool that can help users to identify if their devices have been infected by the Pegasus spyware. The tool is called the Mobile Verification Toolkit.

Mobile Verification Toolkit

Researchers at Amnesty has designed the Mobile Verification Toolkit that works on Android and iPhone. It can identify whether a device has been tampered with and looking for telltale signs that it has been infected by the Pegasus spyware.

The researchers claim that there are more signs that iPhone has been compromised when compared to Android. However, the Mobile Verification Toolkit can detect and estimate if there are any indicators of compromise (IOC) used by the Pegasus spyware maker to infect the device.

How does MVT work on iPhones smartphones? The MVT is able to read an iPhone backup and check for any sign that the device was infected such as Pegasus-related domains which may show up in the device backup, if any such IOC was detected it informs the user.

How does MVT work on Android smartphones? Coming to Android devices, the tool will check your backup for any links to NSO Group's domains sent via SMS while verifying the integrity of all the apps on the user's device to check if they have been infected.

Mobile Verification Toolkit: Availability and Cost

Amnesty has offered MVT for free on GitHub, but at present, it banks on a command-line interface (CLI). This means that the average user might not find it very user friendly. Users comfortable typing in commands can use the feature to check their devices if they have been affected by the Pegasus spyware. For a good start, it is better to read the official documentation by the researchers that explains how the tool works and how one can use it.