Investigative journalist Hugo Alconada Mon reported that the State Intelligence Secretariat (SIDE) has recently approved a National Intelligence Plan that could allow agents to gather intelligence on journalists, economists, academics and other critics of President Javier Milei and his government.

The presidential communications office denied the claims, which were published in La Nación newspaper on Sunday, but acknowledged the existence of the document. Hours later, Alconada Mon reported that he had experienced attempted hacks.

According to Alconada Mon, the document includes routine intelligence priorities also covered by previous governments, such as the fighting drug trafficking and terrorism — but is also “full of generalizations, gray areas and ambiguities” that would allow agents to target government critics. 

The journalist wrote that he had access to the 170-page document and confirmed its authenticity with two sources. He states that the National Intelligence Plan was designed during the second half of 2024 by the SIDE’s management. The SIDE’s director is Sergio Neiffert, who responds to presidential advisor Santiago Caputo. 

According to Alconada Mon’s story, the plan allows the intelligence services to gather information on anyone who “‘erodes’ the public opinion’s trust on public officials who are in charge of the nation’s security,” without distinguishing between activities by foreign intelligence agents and the press or regular citizens.

In the document, all actors who “generate or may generate a loss of trust” in the government’s economic policies are also a point of interest, as are those who may “manipulate” public opinion during elections, spread “disinformation,” affect the public’s “cognitive” processes, or encourage a “distortion” in their perception, without distinction between foreign actors and legitimate critics such as the press, economists, and other subject experts, the journalist added.

A public statement from the presidential communications team denied the accusations and described Milei’s government as “the first administration in decades that has made the political decision not to use the SIDE for the persecution of the opposition, journalists or political adversaries.”

“The National Intelligence Plan is a secret document that establishes the guidelines for the Intelligence System to promote Argentina’s strategic interests,” the statement said, adding that only the president, the SIDE and a special Congress commission that monitors intelligence activity have access to the document.

Milei later wrote on X: “Journalism (90%) the biggest creators of fake news in the history of mankind.”

Hours after the story ran, Alconada Mon said that hackers had attempted to take over his WhatsApp 10 times and his X account once. 

Other focal points reportedly mentioned in the document are poverty, inequality and internal migration that “could constitute a risk” to the country’s development, although it doesn’t specify what this could entail.