New York Times journalist reveals Saudi Arabia's attempt to hack his phone

An American journalist revealed on Wednesday that his phone was subjected to a hacking attempt by the Saudi authorities.

The Head of The New York Times office in Beirut, Ben Hubbard, said that on 21 June 2018, he was a victim of a hacking attempt of his phone with Israeli software, by hackers working for the Saudi authorities.

Hubbard, who wrote a book on the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman and followed up his news for five years, explained that the attempt was made by a suspicious text message he had received on his phone.

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He stated that the message includes a link entitled “Between Hubbard and the story of the Saudi royal family,” but he did not click on it, adding that he searched the Internet for an article having the same title but found nothing, which increased his doubts about the link.

He also pointed out that experts who examined the link confirmed to him that it contained a hacking virus developed by the Israeli NSO group and that it came from hackers working for Saudi Arabia.