Bangladesh bought phone-hacking tools from Israel, documents show

The country’s notorious paramilitary force, Rapid Action Battalion, was among those trained to extract data from mobile phones.

Documents obtained by Al Jazeera’s Investigative Unit (I-Unit) and Israeli newspaper Haaretz reveal how the Bangladesh government spent at least $330,000 on phone-hacking equipment made by an Israeli company, even though the two countries do not have diplomatic relations. Developed by the Cellebrite security firm, UFED is a product that is capable of accessing and extracting data from a wide range of mobile phones. Its ability to hack encrypted phone data has worried civil rights campaigners, who have long called for its use to be more strictly regulated. Bangladesh does not recognise the state of Israel, forbids trade with it and prevents its citizens from travelling there. The Muslim-majority country officially stands in solidarity with the Palestinians on the basis they are denied civil rights and live under Israeli military occupation.