Friends of Washington Post journalist, Jamal Khashoggi, claim he was murdered because he was at the centre of a group of online Saudi protesters battling against a misinformation cyber war.

They believe he was targeted because of his support of the movement. Khashoggi, who disappeared more than two weeks ago while visiting the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, had recently donated $5,000 (£3,800) to the Bee Army, also known as Geish a-Nahla. Not only does the Bee Army work against the proliferation of misinformation, it also offers cyber protection to those needing a safe platform to speak out against the repressive regime.

The movement was founded by Omar Abdulaziz, a Canada-based Saudi activist, who was a friend of Khashoggi. He believes the journalist was targeted by the regime, which wanted to make him disappear too. Saudi Arabian authorities deny they sanctioned the murder, claiming it was a rogue operation they had not been aware of, and they have not responded to requests about Abdulaziz.

These fresh accusations come amid reports there has been a massive spike in both the activity and presence of pro-Saudi automated Twitter accounts since the journalist vanished. Supporters of Khashoggi say they have been threatened by these bot or troll accounts, which they believe may be linked with the regime. They also say that these accounts have tried to replace Twitter hashtags about his disappearance with ones praising Saudi’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Khashoggi’s Involvement in Bee Movement Likely to Have Angered Regime

Abdulaziz told The Independent that the regime had tapped his phone, so it knew of Khashoggi’s involvement in the movement. Furthermore, he believes it was Khashoggi’s support of the group that led to him being targeted.

Abdulaziz said: “Part of what made [the regime] angry with Jamal was because he was specifically working on this project targeting social media. He was the one who was funding us. Since 2016 the Saudi Government started to create these bots that have been behind an online propaganda drive targeting us.”

Abdulaziz al-Almoayyad, also an exiled dissident and member of the Bee Army, supports Abdulaziz’s theory. He said that: “[The regime] is most afraid of the people working together. It always touches their buttons. And Jamal was important.” Almoayyad added: “If people write any opinion or information on Twitter the Government will know who they are, even if they use an alias.”

Twitter Bots Deployed to Hide Support for Khashoggi

Marc Owen Jones, a lecturer in the history of the Gulf Arabian Peninsula at Exeter University, noted that there was a huge surge in pro-regime Twitter activity since the disappearance. Owen Jones asserts that the activity of these bots removed the hashtag announcing the kidnapping from the list of top trends in Saudi Arabia in just a few hours.

“In its place were banal hashtags,” he explained. “There are points where on some days there are tens of thousands of tweets from Saudi bots or trolls in Arabic,” he added. By examining the metadata from the suspect bots, Owen Jones was able to tract many of these accounts to an Alexandria-based Egyptian programmer who has publicly advertised software designed to create Twitter accounts automatically.

The bots’ tweets have been accusing Khashoggi of being a traitor, an Islamist or a member of the Muslim Brotherhood. At the same time they have been trying to drown out any criticism of Saudi Arabia with praise of the Crown Prince.

Twitter Suspends Suspected Pro-Saudi Bots

Twitter has suspended an unspecified number of accounts suspected to be bots, just as Owen Jones suggested. Many of the posts asked people to question reports that Khashoggi had actually died inside the Saudi consulate and said the blame should lie with his fiancée. Using hashtags such as #unfollow_enemies_of_the_nation and #We_all_trust_Mohammad_Bin_Salman the bots were used on mass to boost their message.

It has been reported that NBC News presented the social media platform with a spreadsheet of hundreds of accounts complied by IT professional Josh Russel. The document demonstrated that those accounts were tweeting and re-tweeting the same pro-Saudi government posts and in the same order, like a botnet would do.