Amnesty International has released a comprehensive report titled “We Start with the Verdict: Inside Morocco’s Surveillance System,” which alleges that Moroccan authorities operate a vast monitoring network combining digital and traditional tools to track, monitor, and silence journalists, activists, and other critics. The organization states that this system violates fundamental rights to privacy, freedom of expression, assembly, and association.
Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General, stated that Morocco has fully adopted technological authoritarian practices, acquiring a wide range of surveillance technologies to create a repressive system designed to instill fear in human rights defenders and journalists both inside and outside the country. While Moroccan authorities have repeatedly denied using spyware against their citizens, Amnesty International obtained new evidence proving otherwise, including testimony from a former security source, leaked surveillance data, government records of spyware targeting, and materials from surveillance tool vendors.
The report identifies the General Directorate for Territorial Surveillance (DGST) as the entity responsible for using Pegasus spyware between 2017 and 2021. The source, known by the pseudonym “Safir,” is a former DGST employee who described internal operations over several years. Amnesty International verified key aspects of Safir’s testimony through independent sources, technical evidence, and interviews with ten targeted individuals. The investigation reveals a global economy of technological repression enabled by companies and states failing to uphold international law.
Morocco purchases surveillance tools from companies based in Israel, the European Union, and the United States, including the NSO Group, the now-defunct Italian hacking firm Hacking Team (now Memento Labs), and the British-German network comprising Gamma Group and FinFisher. The report provides the most detailed account to date of the tools used, such as high-tech spyware, audio bugs, and tracking devices.
Digital forensic evidence shows that human rights defenders were targeted using multiple intrusion methods, including physical implantation of software, one-click attacks via malicious links, zero-click attacks requiring no user interaction, and network injection attacks executed through Maroc Telecom, the state-owned telecommunications company. Previously, Amnesty International published the first forensic evidence confirming mobile phone hacks of Moroccan activists using Pegasus.
Safir described how personal devices are hacked and targets are secretly filmed and recorded in homes, offices, cars, cafes, and bedrooms. Phone calls are routinely intercepted, and location data tracks daily movements. The DGST allegedly exploits mobile phone shops to sell devices pre-loaded with spyware and recruits neighbors of targets as informants. These methods affect not only the activists but also their families and professional networks. DGST operatives work without judicial oversight or accountability, targeting activists covertly while remaining immune to prosecution. The ultimate goal is to blackmail, smear, and imprison those who publicly defend human rights in Morocco, creating a pervasive surveillance net that extends beyond national borders.
This report was produced by the HuMedia newsroom.
