FBI’s encrypted communication platform facilitates massive international sting operation

by Karen Faulkner, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – An encrypted communications platform developed by the FBI facilitated a global sting operation that targeted criminality in 16 countries and resulted in over 800 arrests, the Washington Times reports. Led by the FBI, Operation Trojan involved the US Drug Enforcement Administration, the European Union police agency Europol and law enforcement agencies in delivering what police officials described as “an unprecedented blow” to criminal organizations.

In addition to making arrests, police involved in the operation seized 32 tons of drugs (cocaine, cannabis, amphetamines and methamphetamines), 250 firearms, 55 luxury cars, and over $148 million in cash and cryptocurrencies, the Washington Times said.

The operation was based on an FBI-developed app called ANOM, an encrypted platform designed to attract crime gangs in search of new secure phones: law enforcement officials had taken down the EncroChat and Sky ECC platforms resulting in a void that left criminals searching for a new platform, the Washington Times reports.

“There was a void that was created by a lack of these encrypted platforms,” Calvin Shivers, assistant director of the FBI’s Criminal Investigative Division told reporters in the Hague. “So that created an opportunity for collaboration with our international partners, to not only develop the specific tool but also to develop the process of gathering the intelligence and disseminating the intelligence.”

“Operation Trojan Shield is a shining example of what can be accomplished when international law enforcement partners from around the world work together and develop state-of-the-art investigative tools to detect, disrupt and dismantle transnational criminal organizations,” Shivers said.

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