For those who came in late, Hacking Team is notorious for selling its product to undemocratic regimes and Saudi Arabia was one of the unofficial sponsors of the Islamic State death cult 

The Saudis found themselves a bit short when it came to cyber warfare and it did whatever rich people do when they are short of skills, they wrote a big cheque.

According to Il Fatto Quotidiano, the negotiations were handled by Wafic Said, a Syrian-born businessman based in the UK who is a close friend of the Saudi royal family, and also involved Ronald Spogli, a former US ambassador to Italy, who had an indirect investment in Hacking Team.

Fortunately the deal collapsed in early 2014 after Prince Bandar bin Sultan as head of the Saudi intelligence service lost his job. The former Saudi ambassador to Washington had backed the purchase but it was not supported by his successor.

Saudi Arabia, which is the head of the UN's human rights committee, is about to behead and crucify a bloke who participated in anti-government protests inspired by the Arab Spring. Ali al-Nimr has been sentenced to be beheaded and then crucified for crimes he allegedly committed at the age of 17.

However a Hacking Team spokesman pointed out that countries such as Saudi Arabia were allies of the West and it was important that they should receive instruments that enabled them to combat crime and terrorism.

However Hacking Team is not allowed to sell its technology to Saudi Arabia, however it is a little ironic that the whole company could be bought.

As well as being used to track Sunni fundamentalist terrorists, Hacking Team's technology was very likely deployed against Saudi Arabia's internal Shia opposition to the regime.