Harassment Critics of the regime, including bloggers, activists, and journalists, continue to face harassment and prosecution. Some bloggers have been killed, such as Zakariya Rashi Hassan Al Asheri who was tortured to death in prison in 2011, leading others to self-censor and become less critical of the regime online (Owen Jones, 2013). Bahrain Watch (2013a) found that some activists and online critics were being arrested as a result of malicious links—sent from fake Twitter and Facebook accounts that impersonated well-known figures—which when clicked revealed the user’s Internet Protocol (IP) addresses. It is claimed that the Ministry of the Interior’s Cyber Crime Unit was orchestrating these attacks and Bahrain Watch identified more than 120 cases where a government account targeted a Twitter account with the IP-spying link using a public Twitter mention. In the year prior to the report (2012–13), at least eleven people had been imprisoned and charged with insulting the King on Twitter (Bahrain Watch, 2013a). Research by Bahrain Watch (2013b) found connections between the Bahraini government and accounts on Twitter and Facebook which advocated for violence against both the government and protestors. Bahrain Watch found evidence that was “suggestive of a Government connection” and found ‘extremist’ accounts that explicitly advocated violence. For example, @TamarrodAlfateh was an account on Facebook and Twitter that encouraged Bahrainis to “revolt against the terrorists” on 14 August 2013, the same day that the opposition had planned to hold mass protests. Bahrain Watch linked this account to the government through IP addresses. It is important to note that this account had very limited reach, with only four followers (Figure 3). Online harassment is used in combination with physical attacks and intimidation. Blogger Hassan Al-Sharqi was summoned by the National Security Agency in May 2017, and reportedly insulted, beaten and ordered by staff to cease his online activities (Gulf Centre for Human Rights, 2018). 37