McKinsey ‘horrified’ Saudi Arabia could have used report in crackdown

McKinsey & Co said on Sunday it was “horrified” by the possibility that its work could have been used by Saudi authorities to target critics of the kingdom on social media. 

The global consultant was responding to a report in the New York Times that the government used an online army of people at a “troll farm” to identify, intimidate and silence Saudi social media users critical of the authorities, including Jamal Khashoggi, the journalist killed in the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul. 

The newspaper said McKinsey produced a document into the public perception of austerity measures introduced in the kingdom in 2015 and found that they received twice as much coverage on Twitter than in the traditional media. It concluded that negative sentiment outweighed positive reactions on social media and it cited three Twitter users with large followings who were influencing the debate — one of whom was later arrested.

McKinsey, one of several global consultants working in the kingdom, told the FT that the nine-page report was “a short internal document prepared by one of our junior analysts as a showcase of basic social media capabilities, using publicly available information”.

“At this point we have found no evidence to suggest it [the report] could have been misused in any way,” the group said in a statement. It added that it was “urgently investigating how and with whom the document was shared”. 

“We were never commissioned by any authority in Saudi Arabia to prepare a report of any kind or in any form to identify critics,” McKinsey said. “McKinsey has not and never would engage in any work that seeks to target individuals based on their views.” 

A copy of the January 2017 report, titled “Sample scan of Arabic social media analysis” and seen by the FT, lists three Twitter accounts as being “major influencers in Saudi driving discussion regarding austerity measures”. The three included Khalid Al Alkami, who had about 355,900 followers according to the document, Omar Abdulaziz and a person who used the name Ahmad. 

Yahya Assiri, founder of AlQST, a UK-based Saudi rights group, said Mr Alkami was arrested in September last year during a crackdown that targeted prominent clerics, bloggers and activists. He added that Mr Alkami was considered “almost pro-government”. 

The McKinsey document cited an example of a tweet by Mr Alkami that said: “Not objecting on decreasing spending, but decreasing corruption in its entirety should precede citizen’s pockets.” 

The incident underlines how western firms working in the kingdom, where Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is driving a multibillion-dollar economic reform programme, risk facing greater scrutiny in the wake of the global outrage triggered by Khashoggi’s death.

It could not be confirmed if Saudi authorities did use the report as the basis for any action.

Activists accuse the government of increasingly using social media as a weapon to monitor dissent and intimidate critics. The prosecutor-general last week reminded Saudis that spreading rumours or “fake news” — even storing such material on a computer — was punishable by up to five years in prison or a fine of 3m riyals. 

Dozens of activists, bloggers, academics and businessmen have been detained under Prince Mohammed’s watch. Many regard Saud al-Qahtani, a royal court adviser, as the crown prince’s main enforcer. Mr Qahtani was one of two close confidantes of the heir apparent who was sacked after Riyadh admitted that Khashoggi had died, saying he was killed in a fist-fight in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. But he remains head of the cyber security federation according to his Twitter biography. 

The New York Times also reported that Saudi officials tried to groom an employee of Twitter to spy on the accounts of dissidents. The employee was fired from the social media company in 2015, the newspaper said. 

The introduction of social media sites revolutionised public debate in the kingdom, where the traditional press operates under strict restrictions. Saudis flocked in their millions to Twitter and Facebook, but the fear of arrest has meant there are fewer critical voices in the country. 

“Social media is our window so he [Prince Mohammed] is fighting others in the social media,” Mr Assiri said. “Right now, they are asking people ‘why are you following this person?’. In the past it was fine, they are following Yahya and they could retweet me if I’m not talking politics. Now just following me, or Human Rights Watch or any NGO, that would be counted as a crime.”