Overview
- Amnesty International published a 126-page report on Thursday that uses forensic analysis, thousands of leaked records and the testimony of an ex-DGST agent known as “Safir” to attribute a coordinated surveillance programme to Morocco's internal intelligence service.
- The report identifies the Direction Générale de la Surveillance du Territoire (DGST) as a client of NSO Group and links the same attack infrastructure to the 2021 infections of Spanish ministers Margarita Robles and Fernando Grande-Marlaska.
- Investigators say Moroccan services combined commercial spyware including Pegasus with tactics such as selling preinfected handsets, infecting devices in Moroccan airports, using one-click and zero-click exploits, and intercepting networks operated by Maroc Telecom.
- Amnesty documents that stolen recordings and personal data were used in smear campaigns and to publish intimate material, and notes that Rabat had repeatedly denied using interception tools and had not formally replied to Amnesty at publication.
- The findings deepen calls for tighter export controls on surveillance technology, raise the prospect of legal and diplomatic fallout with Spain and France, and underscore how digital and analogue tradecraft can intensify repression of activists, journalists and dissidents.