Majority ruling rejects state immunity claim in alleged laptop hacking case
LONDON: The United Kingdom’s Supreme Court has ruled that Bahrain cannot rely on state immunity to block a civil lawsuit brought by two Bahraini dissidents living in Britain who allege their laptops were hacked with spyware.
In a majority 3-2 decision delivered on Monday, the court dismissed Bahrain’s appeal and allowed the legal case to proceed in the English courts.
The claim was filed by Saeed Shehabi and Moosa Mohammed, who allege that Bahraini authorities infected their computers with FinSpy surveillance software around 2011. According to the lawsuit, the alleged spyware enabled monitoring of their activities related to political prisoners in Bahrain.
The two men launched legal proceedings in London’s High Court in 2020, seeking damages for what they describe as psychiatric harm resulting from the alleged surveillance.
Court says alleged harm occurred in Britain
Bahrain has consistently denied hacking the claimants’ laptops and argued that it was entitled to state immunity under UK law, seeking dismissal of the case.
However, the High Court rejected that argument in 2023, and the Court of Appeal upheld the decision in 2024. Bahrain subsequently appealed to the Supreme Court.
In its latest ruling, the Supreme Court concluded that the alleged surveillance took effect in the United Kingdom, where the claimants’ computers were located, even if any alleged operation had been initiated from outside the country.
Case to return to lower court
The majority ruling found that the claims fall within the personal injury exception to state immunity provided under UK law, allowing the civil proceedings to continue.
The judgment does not determine whether the hacking allegations are true. Instead, it addresses whether Bahrain can invoke sovereign immunity to prevent the lawsuit from being heard.
As a result of the ruling, Shehabi and Mohammed’s claims will now return to the High Court, where the substantive allegations against Bahrain are expected to be considered in future proceedings. Bahrain continues to deny the accusations, and the claims have not been proven in court.
