{"id":214491,"date":"2026-02-17T06:06:00","date_gmt":"2026-02-17T11:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/02\/17\/citizen-lab-links-cellebrite-to-the-hacking-of-a-kenyan-presidential-candidates-phone\/"},"modified":"2026-02-17T09:50:15","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T14:50:15","slug":"citizen-lab-links-cellebrite-to-the-hacking-of-a-kenyan-presidential-candidates-phone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/02\/17\/citizen-lab-links-cellebrite-to-the-hacking-of-a-kenyan-presidential-candidates-phone\/","title":{"rendered":"Citizen Lab links Cellebrite to the hacking of a Kenyan presidential candidate\u2019s phone"},"content":{"rendered":"

Citizen Lab links Cellebrite to the hacking of a Kenyan presidential candidate\u2019s phone<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/cyberscoop.com\/citizen-lab-kenya-cellebrite-phone-cracking-boniface-mwangi-forensic-evidence\/<\/a><\/p>\n

Publish Date: 2026-02-17 06:06:00<\/a><\/p>\n

Source Domain: cyberscoop.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Researchers have found forensic evidence suggesting that Kenyan authorities used Cellebrite\u2019s phone-cracking technology on the device of a prominent human rights activist after arresting him, according to a report published Tuesday.<\/p>\n

The University of Toronto\u2019s Citizen Lab said the intrusion is a sign of growing abuse of Cellebrite\u2019s technology. According to the report, after his widely criticized\u00a0 arrest in July amid mass protest, Boniface Mwangi noticed that his personal phone no longer required a password to access. The government initially suggested it might pursue\u00a0 terrorism charges, but\u00a0 later backed away from that and instead filed lesser offenses.<\/p>\n

After the incident, Mwangi gave his phone to Citizen Lab for forensic analysis. The group said it found evidence of Cellebrite\u2019s use, potentially to extract data from his device.<\/p>\n

Mwangi told CyberScoop he felt a \u201cvery strong feeling of violation\u201d after that, as his phone contained family photos, conversations with loved ones and even his plans for running for president, a bid he announced in August.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been shot, I\u2019ve been jailed, I\u2019ve been tortured, I\u2019ve been assaulted in many, many ways,\u201d he continued. \u201cSo this is more emotional than physical, because I feel like someone was in your private thoughts \u2014 the things that you think, that you think should never be public.\u201d<\/p>\n

Citizen Lab said the incident showed that Cellebrite\u2019s claims of safeguards against abuse via an ethics committee aren\u2019t sufficient.<\/p>\n

\u201cBoniface Mwangi\u2019s case wasn\u2019t the first Cellebrite abuse case, and it won\u2019t be the last, because Cellebrite has a global abuse problem,\u201d John Scott-Railton, senior researcher at the organization, told CyberScoop. \u201cWhen Cellebrite sells their technology to a security service with a track record of abuses, journalists, activists, and people speaking their conscience are at risk. It\u2019s time for Cellebrite to take action and prove that…<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Citizen Lab links Cellebrite to the hacking of a Kenyan presidential candidate\u2019s phone https:\/\/cyberscoop.com\/citizen-lab-kenya-cellebrite-phone-cracking-boniface-mwangi-forensic-evidence\/ Publish…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":214492,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cyberscoop.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-2225403758.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-214491","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cybersecurity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214491"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=214491"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214491\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":214493,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214491\/revisions\/214493"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/214492"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=214491"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=214491"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=214491"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}