Jordan Used Israeli Firm’s Phone-Cracking Tool to Surveil Pro-Gaza Activists, Report Finds

Authorities in Jordan appear to be using an Israeli digital tool to extract information from the mobile phones of activists and protesters who have criticized Israel and spoken out in support of Gaza, according to a new report by the Citizen Lab, a group that investigates digital threats against civil society. The tool is made by Cellebrite, an Israeli firm. The supplied material does not report that the Israeli government directed its use.

The Citizen Lab said a multiyear investigation found with high confidence that Jordanian security authorities had used Cellebrite’s forensic extraction tools against members of civil society, including two political activists, a student organizer and a human rights defender. According to the researchers, when the tool is used by authorities who have physical access to a phone, it can extract photos, videos, chats, files, saved passwords, location and Wi-Fi history, phone usage and web history, social media accounts, and in some cases data a user has tried to delete.

The researchers said they analyzed four mobile phones between January 2024 and June 2025. The phones belonged to members of Jordanian civil society who had been detained, arrested or interrogated, and all had been subjected to forensic extraction using Cellebrite. The Citizen Lab said its findings, based on devices previously seized by Jordanian authorities and on court records shared with researchers, indicated that the use of Cellebrite “likely violated human rights treaties Jordan has ratified.” The report cited the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which requires strict limits on the targeting of political dissidents and civil society with surveillance technology. The names of those targeted were not released because they feared reprisals.

In one case, researchers analyzed the iPhone of a political activist whose device was seized after an interrogation by Jordan’s general intelligence department and remained in custody for 35 days. In another, a student activist refused to give officers a passcode, and officers unlocked the phone using Apple’s Face ID while holding it up to the activist’s face. The activist was taken to prison the next day. After release, the activist received the phone back and found the passcode written on tape stuck to its back. The later analysis found that the device had been connected to an external device attributed to Cellebrite, and that it had also been connected to a cybercrime unit in Amman while in authorities’ custody. Withholding the names of those affected, as the report did, reflects care for people who could face retaliation (Psalm 82:3).

In a statement to the Guardian, a Cellebrite spokesperson said the company’s technology, unlike spyware made by companies such as NSO Group, is forensic in nature and is used to “access private data only in accordance with legal due process or with appropriate consent to aid investigations legally after an event has occurred.” The spokesperson said the company “vets potential customers against internal human rights parameters,” and had historically ceased business in jurisdictions where risks were deemed incompatible with its corporate values. The company said it takes seriously “all allegations of potential misuse” of its technology and would review and investigate any claim once “solid information is shared with Cellebrite.”

The report also noted wider concerns. Cellebrite products have reportedly been used to target members of civil society in Myanmar and Botswana. There have also been indications of their use in Serbia and Belarus.

Source: Read the original report