it was run by this powerful aide — saud al-qahtani.n had authorised the mission. it makes sense to see that reference to the communication office as being a reference to mr saud al-qahtani. al-qahtani wasn't just handling media operations for the crown prince. he was reportedly behind the torture of women activists who dared to drive. and a round—up of saudi princes suspected of disloyalty. "mbs's communications team within the royal court publicly has chastised, and worse, intimidated anyone who disagrees. saud al-qahtani, leader of that unit has a blacklist." he began doing extraordinary services, secret black operations involving cyber security. the saudis for many years have had a policy of, you know, trying to suppress dissent. that became part of his portfolio and he managed it with a particular ruthlessness. the recorded phone calls reveal other senior saudi officials were part of the plot. there are conversations between the consul—general and the head of security at the ministry foreign affairs. he's saying, "say that the miss

saud al-qahtani." we couldn't reach hacking team.speaking inrabic) at that london conferenci attended, dissidents discussed their r ars of being surveilled. >> smith: today the saudi government has the power to hack any of its citizens. ♪ >> smith: in m 2018 yahya al-assiri received a text messagfrom a source he did not recognize. t >> smith: al-assiri was touch with bill marczak at citizen lati >> we were able to both identify the link that he'd received was connected to nsoroup's pegasus spyware.rc >> smith: nso is an israeli company that delops spyware called pegasus. >> it can rn your phoneca microphone on, it can turn on your phone camera, it turns your earphone in a spy device. it can break any encrypted message on your phone. that's technology mbs got froms his new friein secret in israel. ♪ >> smith: is there much an activist lyahya al-assiri can do to prevent themselves from being hacked? >> unfortunately, there's really not. for these sorts of top-tiere targs, when the government i willing to expend essentially unlimited re

." >> saud al-qahtani, he has got an army.nts on you ybe, e comments on facebook. these comments are dirted by him by his team, eier to promome the regi or to write things against what we write. >> smith: wh's the nature ofe thmments? >> that is the nature. the nature is that "mohammed bin salman is a great man. mohammed bin salman is a hero. and dr. al-faqih, mr. so-and-so are all traito."nd >> smith: is it effective in screditing you?s >> it effective in terms of discrediting, but it is effective in terms of timidation. ♪ >> smith: the saudis may have even infiltrated twitter. ♪ in 2015 western intelligence officials learned that the saudis had developed ties with a according to threerces who spoke to "the new york times," they "persuaded him to peeruade into several user accounts." twitter alerteal-faqih that he may have been among those targeted. >> we found out that there was an inv itigation intthis saudi individual aually being a mole of sorts inside twitter for the royal court. >> so being someone twitter, this employe