Al Jazeera anchor Ghada Oueiss sues Saudi and UAE crown princes over phone hack, harassment

She sued Mohammed bin Salman and Mohammed bin Zayed for allegedly hacking into her phone and stealing and doctoring images to silence her

The journalist claims she was a target of the harassment because of her reporting on human rights abuses

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Al Jazeera news anchor Ghada Oueiss. Photo: Twitter

Published: 5:51pm, 11 Dec 2020Updated: 5:51pm, 11 Dec 2020

An Al Jazeera news anchor sued the crown princes of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates for allegedly hacking into her phone and stealing and doctoring images to disparage and intimidate her on social media.

Ghada Oueiss claims she was a target of the harassment because of her reporting on human rights abuses, according to her complaint filed on Wednesday in Miami federal court.

Her suit names Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia and Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan of the UAE as defendants, as well as other officials and agents of those nations.

Some of those officials used US-based entities such as the Saudi Arabian Cultural Mission to recruit US citizens in campaigns to attack critics of the regimes, according to the suit.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Photo: Xinhua

Oueiss says a Miami woman and a man in Orlando, Florida, were responsible for hacking her phone and lifting images, including a video screenshot doctored to make her appear nude and disseminated on social media.