Solicitor Lukas Kudic-Gloster comments on landmark UK Supreme Court spyware ruling, in Law360

Solicitor Lukas Kudic-Gloster comments on the UK Supreme Court’s ruling allowing two Bahraini dissidents to pursue claims against the Kingdom of Bahrain over alleged spyware attacks, clarifying that remote hacking of computers in England may constitute an act in the UK for the purposes of the State Immunity Act 1978.

Lukas’ comments were published in Law360, 29 July 2026.

“This is a significant judgement which clarifies the parameters of state immunity and will allow the claimants to seek a remedy for the surveillance allegedly orchestrated by the Kingdom of Bahrain. More broadly, the judgement recognises how our digital age – where interference with the person and acts of violence can be enacted remotely – has reconfigured the certainties of space and time on which older legislation is premised. It will be fascinating to see how the claim now progresses, both in terms of whether the claimants are able to establish their relatively novel claim of harassment as well as the stance the Kingdom will now take.

“It is hoped that this case will encourage wider discussion on privacy rights and remedies. The spyware at the centre of this claim is fifteen years old, and sophistication of such technologies has grown rapidly as their cost has plummeted, leading to numerous reports that their use is now widespread and routine in democracies and autocracies alike. Those most frequently targeted – politicians, journalists, lawyers and activists – often lack effective remedies.

“Even if, like the claimants in this case, victims learn by chance that their devices have been infected, claims can effectively be barred by the opacity afforded to domestic state actors in such proceedings, which frustrates effective judicial and legislative scrutiny. This sits uneasily with the digital transparency increasingly demanded from citizens by governments, a recent example being the removal of Advanced Data Protection for Apple users in the UK.

“Legislators need to urgently contend with these issues rather than leaving it to the courts to safeguard fundamental principles of liberal democracy.”