ALEXANDRIA, Va. (CN) — A Virginia federal judge found she lacked jurisdiction to review whether the creators of spyware used in the surveillance of slain journalist Jamal Khashoggi are liable for the ramifications of their product.
“Although plaintiff presents a compelling description of her loss from the alleged conduct of the defendants, the court must nevertheless evaluate the issue of jurisdiction,” U.S. Federal Judge Leonie Brinkema, a Bill Clinton appointee, wrote in her opinion.
Hanan Elater Khashoggi claims that during the year preceding the assassination of her husband, a prominent journalist and activist, Saudi Arabia, through the United Arab Emirates, used NSO Group’s Pegasus surveillance tool to infiltrate her phone to conduct surveillance and gather information on Jamal Khashoggi.
“Hanan Khashoggi suffered through the brutal kidnapping and murder of her husband, Jamal Khashoggi, at the hands of Saudi Arabian actors sent by the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman, assisted by allies in the United Arab Emirates,” Hanan Khashoggi’s brief states. “Hanan was then left to deal with the knowledge that her husband’s life was cut short by Saudi agents who perpetuated the killing, using, upon information and belief, knowledge about Jamal obtained by NSO Group from Hanan’s own devices, which were transformed into handheld spies.”
NSO Group Technologies Limited and its parent company Q Cyber Technologies Limited, based in Israel, are hackers-for-hire that create spyware authoritarian governments like Saudi Arabia use to target threats. Their product Pegasus hacked the devices of 11 U.S. State Department employees located in Uganda in 2021.
“NSO Group has made its name amongst authoritarian governments and those known for perpetuating human rights abuses by offering them 'Pegasus,' the world’s most powerful, sophisticated, and infamous cyberweapon,” Hanan Khashoggi’s brief states.
She attempted to circumvent the jurisdictional problems of suing a foreign company by showing a connection between the NSO Group’s conduct and Virginia. She claims that Saudi Arabia initially targeted her phones in Virginia, where she and her husband rented an apartment.
“NSO Group is an Israeli corporation, which plaintiff is suing because it licensed its technology to foreign sovereigns that plaintiff alleges used the technology to monitor devices,” the opinion states. “The complaint never pleads with specificity that any of this monitoring occurred while plaintiff was in this forum.”
According to Brinkema, the NSO Group can evade liability because third-party actors committed the conduct in question.
“Plaintiff does not allege that NSO Group knowingly directed or guided Saudi Arabia and the UAE to use Pegasus to monitor plaintiff in Virginia,” the opinion states.
Jamal, born in Saudi Arabia, covered stories, including the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the rise of the late al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden, for various Saudi news organizations. He was close to Saudi’s royal family for decades before fleeing in 2017 over fear of new leader Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s crackdown on dissent.
Hanan, a flight attendant, and Jamal met at a conference in the UAE in 2009, and Hanan became Jamal’s confidante and friend. After Jamal left Saudi Arabia, he moved to Virginia, where he published a monthly collum for the Washington Post critiquing Salman’s actions. Jamal invited Hanan to his Virginia house to reconnect, and shortly after, they became romantic partners.
After becoming Jamal’s fiancee, she traveled to Dubia for work, where UAE intelligence officials greeted her at the airport, confiscated her devices and detained her for two weeks. Several months later, news broke of Jamal’s assassination at a Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey.
Attorneys representing Hanan declined to comment following Thursday’s ruling. It is still unknown whether Hanan plans to appeal the court’s decision.
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