Executives of top telecom firms accused of spying on each other. A jealous ex-husband suspected of monitoring his former in-laws. Private investigators implicated in computer-hacking-for-hire; one now involved in a possible attempted suicide. So much bad publicity, government officials worry it might impact the entire nation’s economy.

At the center of it all — a tiny computer program that’s caused the biggest corporate scandal anyone in Israel can remember.

Most consumers have heard of software that can spy on them, and their computers. Such malicious software is often brazenly marketed to spouses who suspect their mate is cheating. But that same technology, sometimes called a Trojan horse, because it sneaks onto a victim’s computer in disguise, can be used to commit brazen acts of industrial espionage.

And U.S. experts say what happened in Israel could — and probably already has — happen here.

Israel is now reeling from what some are calling “Trojangate,

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