<https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/feb/16/team-jorge-and-cambridge-analytica-meddled-in-nigeria-election-emails-reveal>
Four weeks before a pivotal presidential election in Nigeria, an Israeli
private operative specialising in political “black ops” was preparing his trip
to the country. On 17 January 2015 the man, who used the alias “Jorge”, emailed
Cambridge Analytica, the political consultancy he was coordinating with on a
covert plan to manipulate Africa’s largest democracy.
“Friends, hi, I will be on the ground tomorrow for couple days … Who is best to
meet there[?]” he asked. “Low profile as we came in on a special visa and we
are watched closely (which is part of our plan :) anyway we need better
understanding of the current status, improve communication and coordinate
plans, we want to run by you a couple things that we might execute if the stars
align. so plz, in very limited circulation, who is best to meet, and whats
his/her position, and contact info.”
Jorge, or “J”, as he signed off many of his emails, was operating separately to
Cambridge Analytica. But his group was coordinating with, and working
alongside, the British political consultancy, which shared a secret mission to
help re-elect Nigeria’s then president, Goodluck Jonathan.
On Wednesday, Jorge was unmasked by the Guardian and its media partners as Tal
Hanan, a hacking and disinformation specialist operating from an industrial
park 20 miles outside Tel Aviv. He calls his group “Team Jorge”, and claims it
has worked covertly on more than 33 “presidential-level” election campaigns on
behalf of clients.
The reply to Hanan’s email asking who to meet in Nigeria was sent by Brittany
Kaiser, a young Cambridge Analytica employee who later featured prominently in
the Netflix documentary The Great Hack, about the company’s Facebook data
scandal.
She copied in the firm’s chief executive, Alexander Nix, and several other
internal and external partners who would be coordinating with one another on
the covert campaign to re-elect Jonathan and discredit his rival, the then
opposition leader Muhammadu Buhari. “If you are on the ground please meet with
SCL [Cambridge Analytica] Nigeria team,” she told Hanan.
Kaiser, who was 26 and based in London, was far from the only person at
Cambridge Analytica involved in email exchanges with Team Jorge over the
Nigeria campaign. She told the Guardian that her “sales” role at the company
meant that she was not involved in any “operational matters with Jorge” in
Nigeria in 2015.
Cambridge Analytica and Team Jorge were, she said, working “separately but in
parallel” in Nigeria for the same client. “I sent some emails to put everyone
in contact with each other and sort out who was doing what as time was short.”
The exchange was one of dozens of emails leaked to the Guardian and Observer
that shed light on the covert coordination between Cambridge Analytica and Team
Jorge in Nigeria. There is no suggestion that Jonathan knew of either Cambridge
Analytica or Team Jorge’s ultimately failed attempts to get him re-elected.
But the emails reveal the covert methods that were used to boost his electoral
fortunes and the ways in which two teams specialising in the dark arts of
political persuasion liaised with one another, with meetings in London, the
Swiss resort of Davos and the Nigerian capital, Abuja. Communications appear to
have occurred on encrypted Hushmail accounts, or special devices used for
secure phone calls.
Perhaps most significantly, they provide the answer to a mystery that has
endured since 2018, when the Guardian and Observer first reported how an
“Israeli contractor” had supplied Cambridge Analytica staff working on the
Nigerian election with confidential material apparently stolen from the Buhari
campaign.
The report was subsequently discussed at length during a UK parliamentary
inquiry. The identity of the unnamed Israeli contractor who purloined Buhari’s
confidential data has – until now – remained unknown.
'Team Jorge' unmasked: the secret disinformation team who distort reality –
video
Dark arts of political persuasion
Hanan appears to have been involved in the dark arts of political persuasion
since 1999 without being detected. That changed on Wednesday, when the Guardian
and other media outlets published undercover footage filmed by three reporters
who met Hanan while posing as potential clients.
The trio captured Hanan as he gave presentations, slideshows and pitches about
the election-influencing services that Team Jorge could deliver to people
wealthy enough to afford them. The undercover footage records Hanan
demonstrating hacking techniques to access Gmail and Telegram accounts to gain
intelligence that could be used against a political adversary.
Quick Guide
About this investigative series
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Hanan did not respond to detailed requests for comment but told the Guardian:
“To be clear, I deny any wrongdoing.”
The undercover footage recorded him talking about having worked extensively in
Africa, and his presentations included brief references to the 2015 Nigerian
election.
In a slideshow called “What we do” he showed a slide with the heading “Wrecking
havoc during African election day”, followed by a screengrab from a newspaper
article that appeared in Vanguard, a reputable media outlet, which reported
how, on election day, leaders in Buhari’s All Progressives Congress party (APC)
discovered their phones were rendered useless because they were bombarded with
calls.
Lai Mohammed, who was the opposition APC chief spokesperson during the 2015
election, appears to have been a target. Now a minister for information in the
Nigerian government, his aide recalled the incident.
“We were at the party’s situation room in the morning of the presidential
election, only to discover that his phone line had been blocked,” the aide
said. “He could neither receive nor make calls, and that was very serious
because he was the live wire of the opposition.”
During his presentation, Hanan showed the undercover reporters another slide
featuring an image of women in Muslim attire who were sitting outside a
Nigerian polling station. Suggesting Team Jorge had secured the publication of
a story about women being excluded from the polling station, Hanan told the
reporters he had “created a big scandal”, adding: “They extended the election,
which was our objective.”
The Nigerian presidential election, which had been due to be held on 14
February, was indeed postponed. The six-week delay was linked to alleged
security concerns over the Boko Haram insurgency. The announcement about the
delay was made by Nigeria’s Independent National Electoral Commission on 8
February.
One of the leaked emails between Hanan and Cambridge Analytica suggests he had
advance information about that postponement.
“I have received strong indication that the elections will not take place on
the 14th, and that plans are made to postponed them in few weeks,” Jorge wrote
on 7 February, the day before the official announcement, saying the information
came from “a top source” and adding: “Plz be carful circulating it.”
Other emails suggest Team Jorge produced YouTube video content to support
Jonathan’s campaign and shared it with Cambridge Analytica, which in turn asked
the Israeli outfit to help promote its videos on the platform.
However, it is the elliptical references to Team Jorge sourcing “information”
for use by Cambridge Analytica that raise most questions.
‘Our clients must see results’
The different roles for Cambridge Analytica and Team Jorge in Nigeria are laid
out in the emails. The British consultancy was tasked with securing coverage by
international media during the election that would benefit Jonathan’s election
campaign, and discredit Buhari.
Team Jorge was responsible for “opposition research”, or finding the material
that could be leveraged to undermine Buhari. When one staffer met “Joel”,
another Team Jorge operative, in Switzerland in January, the imminent poll in
the west Africa country was apparently on the agenda.
They emailed Joel: “We can meet in our apartment or a restaurant here to
discuss what we can accomplish for Nigeria in the short term.”
In another exchange, Joel said he would be the main point of contact to
Cambridge Analytica and suggested the two sides “synchronise on a regular
basis”, adding: “There will be a lot of info which we’ll have to share.”
Cambridge Analytica provided Joel with a Hushmail account –
projectliai...@hushmail.com – and introduced him to the consultancy’s staff in
Abuja.
Cambridge Analytica, which worked on Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign for the White
House, would later be forced to close amid the fallout over revelations it had
harvested 87m Facebook user profiles to help target political advertising. But
in 2015, the company was much more low-profile – one of many western political
consultancies that sought to monetise its services on developing world
elections.
Team Jorge and Cambridge Analytica were not the only forces seeking to help get
Jonathan re-elected. One leaked email lists “Jorge’s Team” among four entities
working in partnership on the Nigeria project: “We are working separately but
must collaborate together in order to maximise our effectiveness. Our clients
must see results.”
Two days later, some at Cambridge Analytica appeared to harbour concerns about
whether Hanan’s team was pulling its weight.
One staffer asked: “What are Jorge and Joel doing? Now is the time to deliver,
I am now led to believe by Jorge that we would not get anything from them until
a few days before the election. This is too late for our client … As you are
aware they are being paid to do opposition research, and as of yet we have
received nothing of substance.”
The same staffer added: “The two secure phones that we are to purchase from
Jorge (have not seen invoice) do not work and we spoke to them about this last
week, these are very expensive and so far we have had no use from them at all.”
It is not clear from the emails what exactly Cambridge Analytica expected Team
Jorge to do on the campaign or how the Israelis would do it. What is clear is
that staff at the British consultancy anticipated the Israelis would be
providing a package of information.
In another email, a staffer working on the campaign asked a colleague for “an
email address for Jorge”, whom she wanted to contact “for some assistance in
sourcing information for the campaign”. The reply copied “Jorge and Joel for
coordination” and added: “I believe the package will arrive this coming week
for you.”
In the end, it appears that Team Jorge’s information was transferred to
Cambridge Analytica at a meeting at the London office.
Clandestine footage of election rival
An account of what happened next was given by Kaiser to a parliamentary
committee three years later. She told MPs that the Israeli contractor – now
known to be Team Jorge – visited Cambridge Analytica’s offices in Mayfair.
“They came to the office for maybe an hour one day, and plugged something into
a computer to show some pieces of information that they had obtained from the
opposing campaign,” she said.
That included, she added, a video from inside Buhari’s campaign meetings,
apparently filmed by a mole planted by the Israeli team. She recalled being
“shocked” and “surprised”, “because they were actually sitting there with the
candidate campaign manager and other high-level individuals on the campaign. I
had never seen that before from campaign consultants.”
The Israeli contractors had also obtained documents, some of which Kaiser told
the MPs were then leaked to the press. She told the parliamentary committee
that she had found the activities of the Israeli contractor “concerning” but
stressed: “I did not know what they were up to until it had already been done.”
When asked for the name of the Israeli team behind the black ops campaign, she
replied: “I don’t remember, to be honest.”
Tal Hanan.
Tal Hanan.
Get in touch
Two months after Jonathan lost the presidential election in Nigeria, Cambridge
Analytica was again considering working with its Israeli partners.
Nix, the Cambridge Analytica chief, emailed Kaiser a question. “What is Jorge’s
(from Israel black ops co) surname please and also the name of his company[?],”
he asked. Kaiser replied: “Tal Hanan is CEO of Demoman International.”
Nix did not respond to questions from the Guardian, other than to say the
newspaper’s “purported understanding is disputed”.
Kaiser told the Guardian that her parliamentary testimony had been a “daunting
experience”, adding: “I didn’t remember the name of the Demoman company when
asked.” She said that she had no prior knowledge of the methods Team Jorge
would end up using in Nigeria.
“Clearly, the making of a political sausage is not pretty in many of its
aspects, and I understand how those who have not seen and experienced it at
close quarters could look at what are regarded as ordinary political behaviours
in democracies around the world and hold a position of moral criticism,” Kaiser
added. “But I do not believe that criminality (with some notorious exceptions)
is rampant.”
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