QuaDream was founded in 2016 by Ilan Dabelstein, a former Israeli military official, and by two former NSO employees, Guy Geva and Nimrod Reznik, according to Israeli corporate records and two people familiar with the business. Reuters could not reach the three executives for comment.
Like NSO's Pegasus spyware, QuaDream's flagship product - called REIGN - could take control of a smartphone, scooping up instant messages from services such as WhatsApp, Telegram, and Signal, as well as emails, photos, texts and contacts, according to two product brochures from 2019 and 2020 which were reviewed by Reuters.
REIGN's “Premium Collection” capabilities included the "real time call recordings", "camera activation - front and back" and "microphone activation", one brochure said.
Prices appeared to vary. One QuaDream system, which would have given customers the ability to launch 50 smartphone break-ins per year, was being offered for $2.2 million exclusive of maintenance costs, according to the 2019 brochure. Two people familiar with the software's sales said the price for REIGN was typically higher.
Over the years, QuaDream and NSO Group employed some of the same engineering talent, according to three people familiar with the matter. Two of those sources said the companies did not collaborate on their iPhone hacks, coming up with their own ways to take advantage of vulnerabilities.
Several of QuaDream's buyers have also overlapped with NSO's, four of the sources said, including Saudi Arabia and Mexico - both of whom have been accused of misusing spy software to target political opponents.
One of QuaDream's first clients was the Singaporean government, two of the sources said, and documentation reviewed by Reuters shows the company's surveillance technology was pitched to the Indonesian government as well. Reuters couldn't determine if Indonesia became a client.
Mexican, Singaporean, Indonesian and Saudi officials did not return messages seeking comment about QuaDream.
Israeli Spyware Vendor QuaDream to Shut Down Following Citizen Lab and Microsoft Expose