In 2018, a hacker hired by the Mexican Sinaloa -Drogel administered by the slander Kingpin Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán spied on the US Embassy in Mexico City with the aim of identifying “interesting people” for the cartel to target and kill, according to a new US government report.
On Friday, the Department of Justice’s Department of Justice revealed the incident as part of Published report Hearing the FBI’s efforts to counter surveillance with the aim of protecting “its employees, surveys and operations.”
The report said the incident of 2018 occurred while the FBI worked on the survey, which eventually leads to El Chapo’s arrest. At the time, according to the report, someone connected to his cartel pushed the FBI to be hired by the criminal organization.
The hacker “offered a menu of services related to the exploitation of cell phones and other electronic devices,” and was able to observe people going in and outside the US embassy in the capital of Mexico, according to the report, including the FBI assistant Legal Attaché, a federal agent who works abroad with local legal authorities.
Somehow – the report does not detail exactly how – the hacker was “able to use” the official’s cellphone number to “get calls and received, as well as geolocity data, associated with” the official’s phone.
According to the FBI, the Hacker also accessed Mexico City’s chamber system to follow the Attaché through the city and “identify people” with whom the Attaché met, read the report.
“By the case -agent, the cartel used this information to intimate and, in some cases, killing possible sources or cooperate witnesses,” the report added.
When he was commented, the FBI reported questions to the Department of Justice, which did not respond to a request for a comment.
For years, Mexico has been on the bleeding edge of surveillance and hacking -skills, on both sides of the drug war.
On the side of the law, over a decade now, numerous local and federal police agencies in Mexico have spent Millions of dollars to use espionage done by Hacking team And then NSO Group to go after cartels, but also Activists And Ist journalists.
On the criminal side, The Sinaloa Cartel used encrypted phoneswhich are specially created devices designed to minimize the risk of surveillance by stripping it from core functions and adding encrypted communication technologies.
According to a Vic -News surveyMexican cartels hit a security program used by local government agencies “to locate and disappear rivals and hide their crimes.”
Earlier in 2015, Mother -board reported That local cartels hired a “hacker brigade” to build and manage their own communication networks. Later in 2017, Mother -board revealed That Hacker working for the Sinaloa Cartel helped authorities track and arrest the wear lieutenant of a cartel, Dámaso López Núñez. The Hacker was originally hired by the Cartel in 2014 to try to hack into the high-security federal Peach Peach, where El Chapo was held from Chapo at the time.
