The trial over Greece’s Predator spyware scandal resumed on Tuesday at the Athens Misdemeanors Court with testimony from former Intellexa employee Panagiotis Koutsios, who worked as a pre-sales engineer from April 2021 to May 2022 and, as the court heard, effectively continued his work for the same operation through another company between May 2023 and March 2024.
Koutsios told the court that during his time at Intellexa he traveled extensively to present the company’s data-analysis platform not simply to public agencies, as he had initially suggested, but directly to foreign intelligence and security services. His trips took him to the United Kingdom, Kenya, Mexico, Colombia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Mongolia. According to his testimony, all demonstrations were conducted in locations secured by police or military forces - an indication of the sensitivity surrounding the technology.
Tension escalated when he admitted that, a year after leaving Intellexa, he resumed the same work through an intermediary company called Remote Greece. By this time the Predator scandal had already broken internationally, and Intellexa’s principals were under investigation. Remote Greece employed several of the same individuals associated with Intellexa, yet Koutsios initially claimed he had not realized the connection. Under questioning, he conceded that the software he was promoting, the nature of the client base and his duties were identical to those of his earlier tenure.
Remote Greece, a subsidiary of Remote Europe Holding B.V., functions as a payroll-services provider, meaning employees appear on its books even though they work under the direction of another entity. This arrangement can obscure the identity of the true employer and complicate efforts to track the movement of personnel or technology. What emerged in court - and what carries significant implications beyond Greece - is that this structure allowed Intellexa to continue operating despite U.S. sanctions imposed on the company and its shareholders over the global deployment of Predator spyware.
Conducting the same activities under an alternative corporate shell, while maintaining commercial outreach abroad, was presented in court as a clear violation of those sanctions, a point underlined repeatedly by lawyers for the civil claimants.
As his questioning intensified, Koutsios acknowledged that the software he presented went by several internal names - Zephyr, Uranus and later Nebula - and that he had been asked to return because he was “needed.” His salary at Remote Greece was nearly double what he had earned at Intellexa.
He eventually confirmed that his presentations abroad were made directly to state intelligence agencies. One of the civil claimants’ lawyers noted that, according to Amnesty International, Predator infections were later identified in two of the countries where Koutsios had carried out demonstrations - Kazakhstan and Mongolia - during roughly the same period.
The atmosphere in the courtroom grew increasingly strained as inconsistencies mounted. At one point the presiding judge accused the witness of «making a fool of us since yesterday», while the prosecutor openly questioned his credibility. His assertion that he barely knew his colleagues, despite participating in online holiday gatherings with them, was among several details that drew skepticism from the bench.
The trial continues as the court attempts to untangle the structure of the Intellexa network, its export of surveillance tools to foreign intelligence agencies and the alleged efforts to circumvent American sanctions through reconfigured corporate entities operating across borders.
