A federal jury in California ordered Israeli cyberintelligence firm NSO Group on Tuesday to pay Meta and WhatsApp nearly $170 million for hacking about 1,400 users on the instant messaging platform.

The spyware vendor, which created the Pegasus surveillance tool, has to pay $167,256,000 in punitive damages and another $440,000 in compensatory damages. The verdict, which presents a win for privacy advocates and Meta, comes after six years of litigation.

WhatsApp sued NSO Group in 2019 after finding out that Pegasus was utilized to hack WhatsApp users’ devices. Reports previously laid out that Pegasus has been used to target human rights

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