CAIRO (AP) — An international rights group says dozens of Egyptian activists, rights defenders and journalists have been targeted by digital phishing attacks in the last two months, likely by their own government.

Amnesty International said on Wednesday that the attacks appear "to be part of a sustained campaign to intimidate and silence critics" of President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi's government.

Ramy Raoof, a technology specialist at Amnesty, said "there are strong indications that the Egyptian authorities are behind these attacks."

Egypt has launched an unprecedented assault on journalists in recent years, imprisoning dozens and occasionally expelling some foreign journalists.

The statement by the London-based group said it analyzed dozens of suspicious emails sent to Egyptian human rights defenders, journalists and NGOs since January 2019.