A university student accused of being one of the ringleaders of a drive-by shooting terror plot downloaded a “spy-proof” messaging program, the Old Bailey heard today.

Suhaib Majeed, 21, was under surveillance by police as he walked around Lisson Grove, where he lived, and the Regent’s Park mosque.

In September 2014, he was communicating via Skype with a “contact” who gave him instructions about downloading the program, the jury was told. He was ordered to use the “special software on his laptop” “to enable him to engage in secret, encrypted communication”, said Brian Altman QC, prosecuting.

The court heard that Majeed downloaded the program, “Mujahideen Secrets”, for those fighting jihad, or holy war. “This was a program specially designed to allow Islamic terrorists to exchange secret, encrypted spy-proof messages with each other for the sole purpose of terrorism,” said Mr Altman.

The court heard that the messages exchanged suggested that Majeed’s contact was “in a different time zone” to London.

Majeed, a physics student at King’s College London, was born in Iran but became a naturalised British citizen in 2002.

He is one of four people on trial over an alleged terrorist plot to kill police, soldiers and members of the public in London. Majeed, Tarik Hassane, 22, Nyall Hamlett, 25, and Nathan Cuffy, 26, all from west London, have pleaded not guilty to conspiracy to murder. Mr Altman has said Hassane had pledged allegiance to Islamic State.

The targets they allegedly researched include Shepherd’s Bush police station and the Parachute Regiment Territorial Army barracks in White City.

The case continues.