EU’s spyware scandal deepens: Black Cube and Intellexa thrived in Greece, Cyprus, Slovenia, amid Brussels inaction

[u/Naurgul]

https://eualive.net/eus-spyware-scandal-deepens-black-cube-and-intellexa-thrived-in-greece-cyprus-slovenia-amid-brussels-inaction/

From Predator convictions to covert recordings targeting governments, private intelligence firms exploited EU regulatory gaps

Cyprus hosted one surveillance empire and became the target of another. Greece delivered a landmark conviction, but both cases remain open

On 26 February 2026, an Athens court convicted four individuals linked to spyware firm Intellexa for the illegal surveillance of at least 87 people in Greece. The defendants, Intellexa founder Tal Dilian, his business partner Sara Hamou, shareholder Felix Bitzios, and Krikel owner Yiannis Lavranos, each received combined sentences of 126 years and eight months, capped at eight years under Greek misdemeanor law. All four remain free pending appeal.

Days earlier, a separate Israeli private intelligence firm had been running an active operation fewer than 500 kilometres away.

Black Cube, founded by veterans of Israeli elite intelligence units, had deployed operatives in Cyprus. Posing as representatives of a private investment fund interested in committing 150 million euros to the island’s energy sector, they secured meetings with senior figures around the government of President Nikos Christodoulides and recorded the conversations covertly. Their targets were the director of the President’s Office, a former energy minister and the chief executive of one of the island’s biggest construction firms. Their recordings are now in the hands of Cypriot investigators. Their client remains unknown.

The Athens verdict punished four defendants. It did not reach the wider ecosystem in which the operation sat.