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Published 19:32 IST, January 26th 2020

Now, UK PM Boris Johnson fears hack by Saudi's MbS after he was 'bombarded' with emojis

Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince has apparently sent a "worrying" number of messages to the UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, causing concerns following Bezos' hack.

Reported by: Aishwaria Sonavane
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Saudi Arabia's Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) found himself at the crux of a diplomatic controversy, after the Guardian revealed his alleged role in hacking Jeff Bezos's phone. Now, similar claims have been made over the security of UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson's phone. As per claims of international news organisation, Mohammed bin Salman has reportedly "bombared" Johnson with emoji WhatsApp messages.  According to the Mail, Kingdom's Crown Prince has apparently sent a "worrying" number of messages to the UK Prime Minister, raising concerns following Bezos' hack. Boris Johnson reportedly exchanged numbers with Mohammed bin Salman when he was the Foreign Secretary of the state. Johnson was known to hand out his private number to world leaders. 

The two had been in regular contact, the Mail reported on Sunday. However, the use of endless emojis by Mohammed bin Salman had apparently baffled Johnson and his team. The 'emojis' became a concern indicating a phone hack by Mohammed bin Salman, himself. London, however, has refused to delve into the details of the WhatsApp conversation between the heads of two state.  Cyber-security experts asserted that Trump's advisor and son-in-law, Jared Kushner should change his mobile phone, over the risks of being hacked by MbS similar to Bezos. Saudi Arabia has refuted the claims, calling it "absurd."

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READ| Trump's son-in-law allowed Saudi Crown Prince MBS to arrest Khashoggi

Jeff Bezos phone hack 

United Nations on Wednesday shared that the forensic findings indicate with "medium to high confidence" that Mohammed bin Salman personally hacked into Jeff Bezos' iPhone to "influence, if not silence," the Washington Post owned by him, over their relentless coverage of Jamal Khashoggi's murder. 

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The richest man in the world, Jeff Bezos had his phone "hacked" in 2018 through a WhatsApp message that was purportedly sent by the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia--Mohammed bin Salman, himself. The Guardian reported that an encrypted message from the personal number of the de facto ruler of the Kingdom was sent to the owner of Amazon and Washington Post, Jeff Bezos on May 1, 2018. Forensic analysts then articulated that the unsolicited file contained malware, which extracted a copious amount of data from his phone, just within hours. “Within hours of the encrypted downloader being received, a massive and unauthorized exfiltration of data from Bezos’s phone began, continuing and escalating for months thereafter,” the report states. 

READ| Jeff Bezos' phone hacked by Saudi Arabia's Mohammed bin Salman? All you need to know

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19:32 IST, January 26th 2020