Jordanian authorities have used the phone unlocking technology from the company Cellebrite to access the devices of activists and human rights defenders in the country, according to an investigation by Citizen Lab. This access, obtained without consent, violates the international human rights treaties that Jordan has ratified. The investigation, published on Thursday, was conducted in coordination with the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and determined that the phones of four activists were subjected to forensic extraction using Cellebrite technologies.
Beware in Jordan!
These are cases that occurred between late 2023 and mid-2025, in a context of protests in support of the Palestinians. The analyzed phones belonged to a political activist, a student organizer, a researcher/activist, and a human rights defender, three of them being iPhones and one an Android device. The court documents related to Jordan’s Cybercrime Law of 2023 provided additional evidence regarding these illegal accesses.
The activists whose phones were analyzed expressed their discomfort and the feeling of vulnerability that this generated, leading them, in some cases, to self-censorship due to a lack of trust in the privacy of their data. “I feel violated, as if something has been stolen from me”, commented one of the affected, on the condition of anonymity.
Cellebrite has stated that it prohibits transactions with entities on sanction lists and ensures that its technology is licensed solely for legal purposes. However, a history of abuse of its technology has been documented in several countries, as reported by Amnesty International in the case of Serbia. Citizen Lab criticized Cellebrite’s responses to its inquiries, deeming them “vague and unfounded.”
The situation highlights concerns about the surveillance of activists in Jordan and the complicity of technologies designed for security, which can be used to infringe fundamental rights.