mohamed bin and jeff plays austere powerful men now linked by a scandal the saudi crown prince is accused of hacking the phone of the american billionaire. denies the allegations an investigation has begun could it mean for bin salman and how vulnerable anyone else speak to such cyber attacks this is inside story. hello everyone i'm come all santamaria so we have the world's richest man we have one of the middle east's most influential leaders and a message between the 2 which will almost certainly change their relationship the allegation is that jeff bezos the owner of amazon in the washington post had his phone hacked by a whatsapp message from the saudi crown prince mohammed bin solomon on its own that could be worrying enough but of course the post previously employed. the journalist who was murdered by a saudi hit squad has been widely linked to the crown prince now the same un players who investigated his killing want an investigation into whether the hack took place and if it was used to extort jeff bezos let's take a quick look now at how it's all unfolded. when mohammad bin salman met jeff bezos in 2018 it was meant to be the start of a closer relationship big strange numbers they sent messages on what sap but a security report commissioned by a base or says it was during this exchange that saudi arabia's crown prince mohammed bin salman hacked the billionaire's phone giving him access to private information any shoulder expert who conducted before and seeking investigation concluded reason medium to or high certainty that the show also the hijacking was a videophile sound to me sto me. out of common account all and by the crown prince just a few months later washington post columnist jamal khashoggi was murdered in saudi arabia's consulate in istanbul it's at this point some experts argue that saudi arabia tried to use back data to extort based oss and to influence articles in the washington post some of his private messages and photos were published by an american tabloid newspaper bezos issued a statement accusing that paper of politically motivated extortion he also drew a connection between the publisher's owner and saudi arabia the kingdom however denies it all you know. how can you help and. here's this is colorful it's ridiculous and it's. in there if you know article it doesn't have any facts and nothing is substantiated in the report that it was based on that was supposed to have been none i have written 6 experts is that experts say the report is compelling but isn't outright proof of saudi arabia's guilt but it's been enough to convince the u.n. it now wants washington to investigate these going to be if you know including by any i assume all of the government is absolutely unacceptable should not be tolerated the u.s. president donald trump has been notably absent from this discussion he's faced criticism for his for. to criticize saudi arabia's killing of caution he's also openly called base also and the washington post a political enemy i won't ever confirm or deny whether investigating anything that you've probably seen from our charges will investigate malicious activity including if it's sponsored by a nation state we don't draw a distinction between purely criminal activity and malicious nation state sponsored activity all of it is a problem that violates u.s. law the reported hack has also raised questions over the vulnerability of the whatsapp messaging app platform reportedly used in conversations between bin salman and senior white house advisor john cushion and someone asking if saudi arabia can hack the world's richest man in what hills has within its reach. as the background let's introduce the panel for today in washington d.c. we have got elizabeth meyers professor of law at the american university in washington also the former editor in chief of inside arabia in beirut regular contributor rami a professor of journalism at the american university of beirut and on skype from washington d.c. . the director of the institute for gulf affairs welcome to all of you i mean clearly i will start with you a bit of background on these 2 men had the relationship what do they have in common what did they have to offer each other when they met back in 2018. i'm a been sold man has tried very hard to get major leading international figures on corporations including entertainment figures business figures and to come to saudi arabia to invest and so you're a bit he wants to be he wants to lead a major what he calls a reform effort an economic restructuring effort inside saudi arabia and he wants this to be validated by people from all over the world so this was a. possibility for him to get one of the most prominent people in the western world to be a partner or an investor or at least a friend and this is something that probably is going to backfire on him because if the if his phone was actually used and probably done by sold than who was how many . computer hacking expert another dirty job. then this is going to be a serious setback because you what you're seeing is all these incredible calls for more investigations not just by the u.n. but also by other groups and people starting to take measures against saudi arabia for instance the state department refused an american contractor the permission to train so the intelligence officials so the saudis are starting to feel a practical backlash and therefore the potential that haven't been so man hope to get from this common relationship is going to actually prove to be very if exactly the opposite is going to be very detrimental 10 and can you just remind us quickly rami going back to that time what was mohammed bin solomon's reputation sort of like then because i mean everything is colored by the case now this was precaution of t.v. and i'm wondering was he still sort of seen. and seen as as as the great or potential great reformer of saudi arabia at that time a lot of people in the west including leading journalists and political figures. were totally taken in by him some of them saw the man as the great reformer and to be fair to him he did make some significant changes within saudi arabia if you think of you know woman wrestling matches and. karma laws popcorn at cinemas houses for men and women though together as a great achievement and some economic reforms he did some really serious changes but this was a moment where much of the western world thought that he was really a positive modernizing force but most people in the middle east i said well many people most but many people the middle east including myself were skeptical we wanted to wait and see what he actually did because while he was reforming and selling this reform agenda to the world and his people he was also a centralizing all power in the kingdom in his own hands so he was acting like saddam percent did or gadhafi did or all these arab tyrants who controlled every lever of power and he was doing the same thing so we are many people in the middle east wanted to wait and see what he actually did before they judge them ok elizabeth my thoughts bring you in from washington d.c. you follow mohamed bin salman and events in saudi arabia quite closely what's your take on the sort of relationship regardless of whether there's been a hacking or not the fact that the head of amazon and the washington post and the effective leader of saudi arabia would be forging a closer relationship. i actually take a different view of the relationship i really don't think that this latest a box which in normal circumstances would cause a rift is likely to cause a huge rift between saudi arabia and the u.s. certainly not with the trumpet administration i i think that. in the states right now we are really in the midst of the pre-election there is very little that appears to assail trump's. standing and i think this is really not going to be one of those things that he cares about and therefore. i think he will just it will just be business as usual between washington and saudi arabia and actually if anything if paul strict was to go by donald trump tends to side with saudi arabia and mohamed bin some of even though it would be and is an american citizen involved i think yes that's quite significant especially in so far as we have our own cia findings on the shocks the murder with you know. intelligence speak of credibility meaning that they are pretty certain that the orders came from m.b.'s himself that that did not change anything and has not changed anything and president trump has not walked back his support for the saudis nor his interest in selling arms and other support for example for the war in yemen so i really don't see any change from this but it is a very serious thing when you know simply because a particular state actor has a lot of money that state actor can tend target the richest person in the world who conceivably one would think would have the wherewithal to protect against that sort of thing i think this is an issue of global security that the un's call for an investigation should be initiated by the united states in particular this is a breach of u.s. law federal law that governs hacking and it's very serious. so there's a bit says it's and from what she says there it is it is a shocking thing which seems to have happened there but perhaps i'm sure you can give us some perspective it's not surprising the idea that what i mean we all know that spying goes on nothing. countries are quite open about the fact that the spying going on but that it extends to hacking in this situation maybe not that surprising it's not surprising in march 2000 teen i received an e-mail from an in and then was on the end it was actually. before and after so that process of trying to hack people so was of computers is nothing. to do and it's why is dating back to the obama administration did receive a. contract to contractor work for the cia. base in virginia which basically does this for what we're. getting by on a search to equip so that it would so the idea that saudi arabia is not doing this it has we have evidence to it you have many people target a. large number of people out of behind bars. 2000 pounds of e-mail phones hacked. and behind bars some died so this is evidence thing is this is this. is it is shocking the united states officials say should be the children searching for the state in general has not the act forcefully against hacking to just man the united states and that. if i had done that if i had hacked or at them to have to face those phone i would be behind bars without them today and tells you that the this this. class in many ways is being. bought by foreign governments actually including some is this is not fear it's almost hourly if this fear of hacking in. concerned about because the 1st thing you said you talked about a name which you received is it something you're conscious of in your communications i mean i'm going to guess that you and probably all full of it 4 of us actually use whatsapp quite freely and other messaging services is it something you are quite conscious of now absolutely it's on my mind when i see and i continue to receive e-mails from people who say click on displaying and i never do even that even though. you know i was in communication a sort of funny over twitter. account which i can do without. notice. anything and it's probably was done. which which has been a relationship. so i've been on was conscious of all of this because i have been it's obvious what time so i'm on my toes these things. and i wish that was because i wish i had some spoke with them on it was that's what they do that is to date and they did not spend any money including mr chip a so so i owe each elite support efforts to combat these these these saudis. attempts to hacker or surveillance many people because that's the only hope they do not sit government. i would say. with great. confidence that the united states government has been hacked by money coming from. ok to silk dress its own mouse so let's look then at some of the reaction that's been to this i think it's predictable enough that saudi arabia has denied it just as it did or certainly denied mohamed bin salmond's involvement with jamal khashoggi but rami hariri can an investigation actually achieve anything when you just have that flat denial. it's difficult to carry out an investigation of the person or a group or country you want to investigate refuses to comply we know this from many cases with israel for instance where many un agencies and other respected international human rights groups have wanted to carry out investigations on the israeli government refuses therefore it makes it difficult but what happens if you do initiate investigations you start gathering credible information from credible sources and there and fact one of the interesting things here is there are several cases in the united kingdom that have just been revealed about saudi nationals who were who were hacked or said they were threatened one guy said he was beaten up by so did he thinks so the agents and they had they requested permission from the british government to raise a lot of case a suit against the saudi government and the british courts on the on the verge of course just agreed they could do that so we're going to start getting a lot cases and these are going to bring out a lot of information so it it could generate greater and greater verifiable facts about what the so the government is or is not doing we have to presume they're innocent until proven guilty the problem is that when they deny something they have a track record of lying and cover up with the her shoji affair so it's you can't take their denials very seriously so the best thing to do is to get a credible investigation about about these issues because it is going to be a serious problem if powerful countries like saudi arabia go around hacking people and you can get information then you can blackmail them you can do other stuff one by one report was that the so does use their pictures of bezos to have the nationally hire or do their. report so this has to stop at some point but elizabeth is right the trump initiation is not going to do anything they're going to support how much been so man all the way but it's other people we should look at including for instance the u.s. senate. other of agency is international as well as domestic there was a report that the f.b.i. upon point in the us stopped an attempt by the saudi government to kidnap or so the national from san diego taken back home and the f.b.i. got involved in that and stopped it so yes you have to investigate and do the best you can to get the facts out and then let the facts speak for themselves well elizabeth should it be or who should it be should i say that conducts any investigation obviously the united nations has spoken up already we heard agnes kalama speaking before but i mean i was think of the u.n. is something which investigates which mediates between. countries between states the hey you've got a state actor definitely but jeff bezos is still a private citizen. well i think that the investigation probably should be with the u.s. in the 1st instance and to the extent that i totally agree with rami about compiling the evidence as best one can even though the state actor refuses to acknowledge or comply with with any requests for information or even assertion of jurisdiction and then if once the investigation uncovers more evidence then the consequences can be economic because it seems to me that with what have been some. vision 2030 efforts and incredible efforts to have investment in the kingdom that if the investigation uncovers credible information that it was at his command request his purchase of israeli spy software and working with israeli companies to do this then the there should be economic consequences by the market by investors by not agreeing to invest in a country that so blatantly contravenes both international law and domestic u.s. law in such in such a way and unfortunately what what happens here just as with they attempt to have this plausible deniability scenario where with the case it was said that it was oh it was not the crown prince who ordered this it was some rogue team of of 15 operatives who did this but the evidence has mounted we have cia evidence against that we have a u.n. special op authority which has found other ways and i think we will find the other we will find the same thing here that as the evidence mounts there will be and should be culpability and if one cannot do it legally one must do it internationally an echo. comically do you see any signs of change there as elizabeth have both pointed out already the united states certainly under donald trump isn't going to change its relationship with saudi arabia or mohamed bin some on but as we keep pointing out when something the high profile like this happens to the world's richest man as we keep saying is that maybe something which would make people sit up even more if the murder of jamal khashoggi didn't. they amend disaster killing jamal hustles jr and other crimes that have been committed by saudi government someone tickler hasn't changed you know it's just politics in america and a must but it's into really has to take takes power to decide and i say even if mr basis even with the chapmans decided that he would invest in an effort to bring these issues to do to the senate and the president it will happen i think he has enough money to do it and i wish and i hope he will because that's the only way. to miss a ship as something unique in terms of its relations with saudi arabia this would have happened when that administration in a different way but it would have been the same because there is no. choice at the something else this will continue with other administrations so that's why i think right now the ball is in the faces court if he wants to do this. for basically a. revenge or personal issue or he can do it he has enough money to do with it. but in some support these isn't it amazing how to this is just a general full for all of us but maybe rami i'll start with you isn't it amazing that we've been talking about this and that we know that the world's richest man and this influential. saudi lead it we're even communicating by whatsapp when i think about communications between big act as you think will you know secret lines secure lines white house well you know all the spots of things but i mean the fact that we even know they're communicating on whatsapp and i think you mentioned it as well. john cushion or as well white house senior adviser we know of his what's happening as well. well even trump is probably what's having the you know what comes into play here is the ego factor these are people who have huge amounts of power when you're talking of trump cushion or been solomon and jeff bezos you're talking about 4 of the 10 most powerful people in the entire world in the entire history of humankind and these these men have huge power and it goes to their head they think they can do anything they can break the law the law doesn't apply to them they can and bite anybody to be their friend so that the ego factor kicks in and caution and the rule of law and basic decency gets thrown out the window in many cases and the real problem here besides the specifics of this case the the what's up and bezos m m m m salon and other things that the saudis have been accused of the real problem is that this is expanding all across the arab world and other countries and in the world but in the arab world we have a real serious problem of state surveillance of not just dissidents but ordinary people and today literally today the general $25.00 in egypt and a version of the uprising there have a lease or stopping anybody on the street to look at their phones check who's who are their friends and what they said on face the facebook and whatever so this is the surveyance intrusive. culture is really a big problem and results in many of thousands of people in jail rami i'm running out of time such as in leave the final word to 60 seconds left with elizabeth i wonder if it's actually comes down more to access than technology world leaders giving out they want south numbers then they give up a certain level of privacy that way. well i think that it's so prevalent as a means of communication but the i think one of the big issues right now is how easy it is to do it it used to be that you would have to click on a link to actually have something downloaded to your phone and therefore all your data wiped or stolen now you don't have to do anything and i think this really raises security concerns about how we go forward in this age of global connectivity and how we protect not only our data but national security issues you know and the game changing every day doesn't it look thank you 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