Amnesty: Moroccan intelligence ran 'web of surveillance' against journalists

Amnesty International has published a new report identifying Morocco’s domestic intelligence service, the Direction Generale de la Surveillance du Territoire (DGST), as the body responsible for deploying Pegasus spyware in Morocco, and documenting its use against activists and journalists between 2017 and 2021.

The report, “We start with the verdict: Inside Morocco’s surveillance machine” (Index MDE 29/1447/2026), is built on testimony from a whistleblower known as Safir, a former DGST employee, corroborated with digital forensics, leaked surveillance data and interviews with ten targets of surveillance.

Amnesty says the DGST’s methods went far beyond spyware: phone calls were routinely intercepted, locations tracked, and targets secretly filmed and recorded in detention, offices, cars and bedrooms. Journalist Omar Radi had hidden microphones implanted in his apartment’s light fixtures, while phone shops were co-opted to sell handsets pre-infected with spyware. Analysis of 103 Moroccan phone numbers entered into Morocco’s Pegasus system matched 22 journalists and media workers as potential targets, alongside 34 human rights defenders, five lawyers and four academics. Private material was then fed to state-aligned media for smear campaigns.

“Morocco has wholly embraced techno-authoritarian practices,” said Amnesty secretary general Agnès Callamard. Amnesty wrote to Moroccan authorities four weeks before publication but received no response; Morocco has repeatedly denied using spyware. The Committee to Protect Journalists urged Morocco to end the surveillance on 1 October, calling the findings “a chilling picture of the scale and methods of surveillance targeting journalists”.