In 1906, French newspapers in Algeria celebrated the capture of a dangerous activist, the head of a mysterious committee that had been advocating Islamic unity. Yet the culprit, Khoualdia Salah, had been born to a prominent notable family in Eastern Algeria that were loyal servants of the French colonial state. Khoualdia had ended up in this position less because of his political opinions than because of his position with the news system of the early 20th century. This paper traces the trajectory of this unusual character to show the importance of intermediaries in generating the media panic of ‘pan-Islamism’ in the years before the First World War. This was a time when European news markets’ appetite for knowledge about Muslim networks created possibilities for cunning men to find employment. It was also a time when the categories of activist, journalist and spy were blurred. Men like Khoualdia navigated these categories to find an outlet for their political ideas and a form of social advancement commensurate with their intelligence. Like others at his time, Khoualdia was an educated man for whom there were few employment possibilities in French Algeria. For a while, he worked as an interpreter for the French army, a job which saw him sent on his first missions to West Africa. Ambitious, he was unsatisfied with this job, and embarked on a complicated transnational career that led him from Constantine to Conakry, from Khartoum to Constantinople, London and Paris. At various times, he worked for the British, German, French and possibly Ottoman governments, associated with Polish anarchists, German spies and other shady figures. But most of all, we can understand Khoualdia as a kind of newsmaker, both in the sense of producing content and producing stunts, relentlessly pursuing attention through his articles, reports, and activities.