In a press release, Mediterranea said WhatsApp notified its founder Luca Casarini last week that he had been targeted with spyware made by Paragon Solutions, an Israeli surveillance tech startup. On Friday, WhatsApp said it had disrupted an espionage campaign using Paragon spyware that targeted around 90 people.

WhatsApp has revealed it has disrupted a spyware hacking campaign targeting journalists and prominent members of civil society. The spyware in question belongs to Paragon, a commercial spyware company founded by former Israeli intelligence officers, which Meta-owned WhatsApp has directly implicated in the campaign.

An official with Meta Platforms' popular WhatsApp chat service said Israeli spyware company Paragon Solutions had targeted scores of its users, including journalists and members of civil society.

WhatsApp said users in several European countries were targeted with Paragon spyware, according to the Italian government.

A senior executive at chat service WhatsApp alleged that Israeli spyware company Paragon Solutions attempted to breach the devices of 90 users including journalists, "Reuters" reports. Paragon declined to comment on the report.

Italy's government said on Wednesday that seven mobile phone users in the country had been targeted by spyware on Meta Platforms' WhatsApp messaging service, and it called the incident "particularly serious".