Kriti Mehrotra
As a documentary living up to its title in every way conceivable, HBO’s ‘Surveilled’ can only be described as equal parts baffling and intriguing. That’s because it follows journalist Ronan Farrow as he investigates the growing commercial spyware industry, with a particular focus on the program Pegasus by Israel’s NGO Group. The company always billed this product as untraceable and actually sold it to over 45 nations across the globe, but most of them did take advantage of it to spy on politicians, activists, as well as individuals like Elies Campo.
Elies Campo is a Career Tech Enthusiast
As a proud native of Spain, it was in 1997 that Elies kickstarted his career in the tech industry by establishing a radio station from the ground up with some friends while still at school. They actually managed to own-operate Sants 3 Ràdio till 2001, only to then find a non-profit organization called Associació Enllaç Comunicació LocalAssociació to help people find the right tools to expand their services. It was only then, in 2003, that he enrolled at La Salle BCN to pursue a degree in Telecommunications Engineering, which he earned in 2010 – during this, though, he also completed an entrepreneurship course from the University of Cambridge.
Then came Elies’ decision to do an Executive Program at Singularity University in 2012, and then he finished his formal studies with a Certificate in Powering Innovation and Entrepreneurship from the Stanford University Graduate School of Business. However, what’s even more imperative to note is that throughout this period, he had already founded three companies at different levels – he served as the founder and CEO at Tot a Punt Ebay Store from 2005 to 2007, served as a Founder, investor, and advisor at AlertaPhone from 2007 to 2013, and then founded a multi-platform messaging service called FastDove from 2009-2013.
What’s even more imperative to note, though, is that Elies was a Growth, Partnerships, and Business Development executive at WhatsApp from 2013 to 2014 and then at Telegram from 2014 to 2021. This is all the while, he began dabbling as an Angel Investor, which soon led him to the Citizen Lab and their work with tracing and identifying the misuse of Pegasus, leading him to join them too. He was thus stationed in his homeland of Spain as a fellow and used his expertise and a program to identify whether phones had been compromised, only to find many. Then, it turns out that because he had an American number, the phones of his parents and sister were also compromised in the hopes something about him would come to light.
Elies Campo is Leading a Good Life as an Angel Investor
Considering everything Elies has been through over the past few years and the way the privacy of his family was stolen, it comes as no surprise he prefers to keep his personal life well away from the limelight these days. However, we do know he continues to serve as a proud Angel Investor with an interest in all things technology while being based in the San Francisco Bay Area, all the while still serving as a Fellow at Citizen Lab. At the latter organization, he is essentially using his expertise to identify who has been compromised and why, all the while also figuring out if such unforeseen attacks can somehow be identified and stopped before something dire happens.
Elies’ work is actually so prevalent in today’s day and age that he has since even given several interviews to reporters across the globe, and even former President Barack Obama follows him on X (formerly Twitter) to see what he has to say. In any case, it’s not easy being in his position and knowing that some nations want to know his every move, but Elies is evidently doing the best he can and trying to move forward in a way that could maybe bring about a positive change to such spyware in the future.
Read More: Zoe Campos’ Murder: Where Is Carlos Rodriquez Now?
