Following the widely-condemned arrest in July 2025 of prominent Kenyan opposition voice Boniface Mwangi, the Citizen Lab analyzed artefacts from devices seized during the arrest. We found that Cellebrite’s forensic extraction tools were used on his Samsung phone while it was in police custody. This case adds to the concerning pattern of the misuse of Cellebrite technology by government clients.

Through a multi-year investigation, we find that the Jordanian security apparatus has deployed forensic extraction products manufactured by Cellebrite against civil society devices. We release these findings alongside reporting from the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) which includes interviews with a few of the victims.

French penetration testing specialist Synacktiv has plans to step on the turf of Israeli company Cellebrite, a leader in phone data recovery solutions.

Both companies have faced controversy in recent years, primarily for their work in circumventing mobile device security features