Digital forensic researchers on Wednesday accused Kenyan authorities of installing spyware on the phones of two filmmakers who helped produce a documentary about the country’s youth uprising.

The filmmakers Bryan Adagala and Nicholas Wambugu were arrested on May 2 and released a day later, but authorities held their phones until July 10. The Kenyan government is believed to have installed the spyware FlexiSPY while authorities had custody of the devices, according to Ian Mutiso, a lawyer representing the filmmakers.

FlexiSPY, which is commercially available, can be more easily detected than far more expensive mercenary spyware available to nation states but has similar capabilities once installed, said John Scott-Railton, a forensic researcher at The Citizen Lab who helped confirm the infection.

The company targets its product to parents and employers who want to “know everything that happens” on a device. Its spyware can record calls, track locations, listen through microphones, download photos and capture emails and text messages.

Adagala and Wambugu were arrested for allegedly publishing false information, Mutiso said, but were never charged.

The Kenyan government has increasingly cracked down on protestors and suppressed dissent. The filmmakers’ documentary, The People Shall, highlights the efforts of young people seeking more freedoms.

The Kenyan Embassy did not immediately respond to questions about the researchers’ findings.

FlexiSPY played a role in the arrest of Joaquín Guzmán, the Mexican cartel leader known as El Chapo. Guzmán used the spyware to snoop on several girlfriends. The FBI ultimately used his exchanges with several of them — obtained from FlexiSPY — to build their case against him.

“It’s a theater of the absurd when your government uses spyware previously used by drug kingpins to spy on their spouses,” Adagala told Recorded Future News in a text message.

It feels “deeply unfair that filmmakers have to be taken through this kind of mess just for doing their work,” Wambugu said, also in a text message.