It has, in recent years, approved the export of advanced technologies to intelligence agencies and government agencies in a number of countries, including Azerbaijan, Serbia, Malaysia and Mexico.
At the center is the Sofia-based company Circles BG, which is linked to the Israeli conglomerate NSO Group, known internationally for its Pegasus spyware.
The revelations, based on leaked export licensing documents, bring back to the fore the debate over control of Europe’s cyber surveillance industry and the limits of EU oversight mechanisms and are also directly related to the case of the wiretapping scandal in Greece. And this is because one of the co-founders of Circles is .
It is recalled that the former commander of a unit of the Israeli military intelligence and founder of Intellexa, the business scheme that developed and marketed the Predator, had stated on March 13 on the show Mega Stories with Dora Anagnostopoulou: “” refuting the government’s narrative that the surveillance scandal was an affair between “private individuals”.
Dilian was connected to a complex network of companies operating in Greece, Cyprus, Ireland and other countries, while the case continues to cause a political storm in Athens, parliamentary investigations, European interventions and intense international criticism.
In 2024, the United States imposed sanctions on Dilian for his role in developing and making available surveillance technologies that, according to US authorities, were used against journalists, academics, special analysts and government officials.
Circles and the global tracking network
Long before Predator made headlines in Greece, Circles had already developed a different but equally powerful surveillance model.
Instead of infecting devices with malware, the company exploited weaknesses in international telecommunications networks to locate cellphones and collect communications data.
Expert investigations had documented the company’s activity in several countries, revealing its ability to track targets through the very architecture of global mobile networks.
The new evidence shows that the technology has been exported to government intelligence agencies, law enforcement agencies and military agencies in dozens of countries.
From Serbia to Azerbaijan
Customers listed in the documents include Azerbaijan’s Foreign Intelligence Service, which acquired server equipment, data storage and mobile phone tracking technologies.
In Serbia, the interior ministry procured a portable mobile surveillance system just before the 2023 elections, while similar exports are being recorded to government agencies in the United Arab Emirates, Malaysia, Bahrain, Morocco, Brazil and other countries.
Human rights groups say several of these states have been accused in the past of abusing surveillance technologies against citizens, activists and journalists.
The Greek dimension of the case
The new evidence reinforces the picture of an international business ecosystem linking NSO Group’s Pegasus, Intellexa’s Predator and Circles’ telecommunications surveillance technologies to government entities and intelligence agencies.
The Israeli businessman Tal Dilian’s side, as revealed by , invokes similar documents from Greek state agencies in the form of a “letter of recommendation” for the successful operation of the Predator in Greece, in order to facilitate its export to third countries. Among them, government documents of assurance and confirmation of adequate performance are said to be included, i.e. Reference Certificate and Certificate of Good Performance, but mainly the Government User Certificate.
The above certificates, according to the report, were issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the period 2020-2021 in order to facilitate the export licenses of the Predator to countries such as Sudan, Madagascar and Ukraine. The licenses were reportedly approved by the competent Directorate B6 of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which handles exports of dual-use products. In some of these exports, the Krikel company of Yiannis Lavranos, also convicted in the Predator case, a close friend of the nephew of Prime Minister Grigoris Dimitriadis, was also involved.
The release of the Bulgarian licenses does not prove illegal use of the systems or violation of export rules. But it sheds more light on the range of activities of companies linked to Dilian and highlights how the spyware industry has evolved into a global market with a strong geopolitical footprint, with government agencies as clients.
Brussels faces new dilemmas
The revelations come at a time when the European Commission is preparing a new review of the export control framework for dual-use technologies.
The Circles BG case is expected to be one of the central examples in the debate on whether European control mechanisms can prevent the deployment of surveillance systems in both EU member states. as well as in countries where there are serious concerns about human rights and democratic accountability.
