Security News > 2020 > January > Questions Linger Over Investigation Into Jeff Bezos' Hacking
Cybersecurity experts said Thursday there were still many unanswered questions from an investigation commissioned by Jeff Bezos that concluded the billionaire's cellphone was hacked, apparently after receiving a video file with malicious spyware from the WhatsApp account of Saudi Arabia's crown prince.
The report further pointed to messages later sent from the prince's WhatsApp account to Bezos that showed "Apparent awareness" of private information.
One included a meme with a photo of a woman the report said resembled the woman Bezos was having an extramarital relationship with before going public with his divorce.
One sticking point centered on WhatsApp's end-to-end encryption, which the report said made it "Virtually impossible to decrypt contents of the downloader to determine if it contained malicious code" - meaning the investigators could not conclude whether the video file sent from Prince Mohammed's WhatsApp account was infected and used to hack Bezos' phone.
Theresa Payton, founder and CEO of Fortalice Solutions, said the report is credible in her opinion, but leaves some questions unanswered, including whether the crown prince's WhatsApp account may have been hacked by a third party, meaning he was not the true attacker.