Dr. Claire Launchbury, Visiting Scholar, University of Leeds

ActforPal Media & Communication

A recently published investigation by Al Jazeera and Liberty Investigates uncovered evidence that twelve UK universities paid the private firm Horus Security Consultancy, run by former military intelligence officials, to scan the social media and examine the activities of pro-Palestinian students and academics.

This evidence came in the context of the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act, which came into force in August 2025. The act gives the national Office for Students powers to investigate and take action if lawful free speech is silenced by higher education institutions, including, it was announced on 20 April, fines of 500,000 GBP or 2% of the institution’s income—or loss of public funding altogether. Yet the focus for this version of free speech would appear to be focused solely on culture wars talking points such as condemning opposition to platforming gender-critical academics.

A Department for Education press release notes that ‘Jewish community organisations had also raised fears the tort might lead some providers to unduly prioritise speech which is hateful or degrading over the interests of those who are at risk of being harassed and intimidated,’ a legitimate point when decoupled from the implicit suggestion that speech supportive of Palestine is in any way antisemitic or intimidating. The press release does not state which, if any, other community organisations were consulted or had raised concerns.         

In a climate in which universities have been initiating multiple rounds of both voluntary and compulsory redundancies, the 12 institutions investigated paid Horus 440,000 GBP to undertake ‘public domain’ investigations into security risks, profiling students taking action in support of Palestine as well as providing ‘encampment updates’ at a substantial subscription cost.

A recent advertisement for a full-time research and analysis post with Horus indicates a starting salary of 26,000 GBP per annum, slightly below minimum wage and significantly below the sector salary average of 33,000 GBP, suggesting both unethical employment practices and substantial profit margins. This fits within the now longstanding frame of universities outsourcing labour, such as cleaning and security, in order to bypass contractual obligations. This is a practice long encouraged by the representative body Universities UK as a cost-cutting measure as state funding and fee income diminishes.

The hiring of Horus comes amid concerns over attitudes and actions towards students engaged in pro-Palestine activities and protests against the genocide in Gaza, treatment which undermines the social role of the university and its core academic endeavour and principles. In a significant intervention, Associate Professor Shireen Seikaly of UC Santa Barbara considers Palestine as paradigm because it shifts the epistemic field in such a way as to expose the structural hypocrisy at work in the Global North academy.

It is clear that the genocide in Gaza as well as the unlawful war in Iran and the destructive illegal occupation of Lebanese land should result in straightforward condemnation and support in line with responses to the Russian aggression and invasion of Ukraine. Instead, institutions of higher learning have paid for intelligence on their own community, surveilling their students in breach of academic and community freedom in every sense.

As Nicola Pratt, president of the British Society for Middle East Studies (BRISMES), told us: ‘These findings point to a troubling continuation of efforts to suppress expressions of solidarity with Palestine and open discussion of Israel’s war on Gaza across UK university campuses—developments that the BRISMES Committee on Academic Freedom has been closely monitoring. Such practices risk stigmatising an entire field of study and debate, sending a message that engagement with Palestine is inherently suspect. This risks creating a chilling effect on students and staff, undermining the core mission of universities as spaces for critical inquiry and open exchange, and raising serious concerns about their commitment to upholding freedom of expression and academic freedom.’