Amnesty Says Morocco Bugged the Press Room

Amnesty International published an investigation on Thursday alleging that Morocco’s domestic intelligence service, the DGST, used Pegasus spyware, compromised phones, wiretaps, physical monitoring, and hidden microphones against journalists, activists, and human rights defenders. Amnesty attributes Pegasus deployments to the DGST between 2017 and 2021. The report names imprisoned journalist Omar Radi among the targets and alleges that microphones were concealed in light fixtures inside his apartment.

Amnesty based the report on testimony from a former DGST employee, leaked documents, and earlier journalistic investigations. The organization says it matched 103 Moroccan phone numbers entered into the Pegasus system between September and December 2017 to specific people. Entry in a targeting system is significant, but it does not by itself prove that every phone was successfully infected. The public account also does not supply a device-by-device forensic finding for every named or numbered target.

The former employee described shops selling phones allegedly infected by DGST agents, spyware installed in internet cafes, and devices physically compromised at airports. The source also alleged secret recording in offices, cars, detention facilities, and bedrooms. These claims differ in evidentiary status from a verified infection trace on a particular handset. That distinction does not neutralize the allegations. It identifies what an independent investigation must test.

Surveillance can edit before publication

A government does not need to ban every article if reporters believe each phone call, room, and source meeting may include an unseen state witness. A compromised device can expose contacts, drafts, travel, photographs, and authentication codes. A concealed microphone can make an ordinary interview hazardous to both participants. The censor’s red pencil appears late in the process; surveillance can prevent the sentence from being gathered at all.

Granted, states have legitimate authority to investigate defined security threats. Morocco has repeatedly denied using spyware against its citizens, and Moroccan authorities did not respond to Amnesty’s letter sent four weeks before publication. Al Jazeera also reported that it could not immediately obtain official comment. A national-security justification would still need a lawful mandate, a specific target, proportional methods, and independent review. Secrecy may protect an operation, but secrecy cannot serve as the operation’s only legal argument.

The missing chain of authority

The central questions now concern procurement and permission. Investigators need to establish whether a Moroccan agency contracted with NSO Group or an intermediary, which officials approved deployments, whether judges issued warrants, and what limits governed retention and dissemination. Vendors also bear responsibility for auditing customers, preserving abuse reports, and suspending access when credible evidence shows that their products targeted journalists or rights defenders unlawfully. Targets need independent device examinations, notice where possible, secure replacements, and a route to challenge collected material.

The assessment should change if Morocco discloses valid warrants tied to specific threats, independent examiners reject Amnesty’s technical claims, or procurement records show that the alleged agencies lacked access to the identified systems. It should harden if device forensics, contracts, authorization logs, or credible internal investigations confirm systematic misuse. Until those records emerge, the proper response is neither automatic acquittal nor careless certainty. It is preservation of devices, protection of sources, and an investigation with authority to compel the state and its suppliers to produce evidence.