Today, 11 March 2022, ALQST launches its new Digital Rights Unit, which aims to support internet users inside and outside Saudi Arabia, as the country’s rulers continue to crush basic freedoms in the digital age.
The Saudi authorities’ sweeping repression has increasingly extended to the online space in recent years. The internet has been weaponised as a tool of censorship, propaganda and surveillance, making it increasingly difficult for users to keep themselves safe.
Saudi Arabia has one of the highest numbers of active internet users in the Middle East and North Africa, particularly among its youth, who make up a majority of the population. While the internet was once widely perceived as a space in which they could voice and exchange opinions that they never dared to express in real life, over the years it has become clear that the Saudi authorities will not tolerate free speech online.
The authorities now exert a great degree of control over online information. They routinely hack and block websites and internet accounts that might interest the public, such as the websites of ALQST (blocked since 2015), Amnesty International, and others that might contain critical material.
Furthermore, they have cracked down harshly on individuals who peacefully express opinions online. Countless activists and peaceful critics have been arrested, tried and sentenced under draconian laws such as the Anti-Cybercrime Law, for expressing critical opinions in online publications or on social media including Twitter.
As a result, more and more Saudis either self-censor or tweet anonymously using aliases, but even then they may not be safe. In November 2019, for instance, two former Twitter employees were charged in the United States with spying for the Saudi authorities by accessing the private data of Saudi dissidents using the platform.
The Saudi authorities have also used foreign companies to carry out cyber surveillance, most notoriously involving Israeli spyware company NSO Group, as highlighted by the Pegasus Project’s findings published in July 2021. Known targets of NSO’s Pegasus surveillance spyware have included ALQST’s founder Yahya Assiri and its late Executive Director Alaa Al-Siddiq, among many other human rights activists and journalists.
As Saudi Arabia's leaders seek to attract further foreign investment and carry out grandiose projects like the megacity of Neom, touted as “the world's first cognitive city", there are very real threats of even more pervasive forms of surveillance in the future.
In light of this, ALQST's Digital Rights Unit will embed digital rights concerns into all aspects of the organisation’s work, with the aim of helping to protect human rights and freedoms in the digital age. This includes actively monitoring digital rights violations, providing digital tools and support for internet users inside and outside Saudi Arabia, and carrying out targeted advocacy and campaigns to help end corporate complicity.
