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Comment by Judgmentality | Hacker News Reader

I'm confused. I understand these phones were (very likely) used by the FBI to surveil suspected criminals. What I don't understand is how the FBI got the phones to those people, and even stranger why those people would trust these phones to be safe?

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It's touched on in the article, and https://www.vice.com/en/article/m7e733/anom-fbi-andrew-young... explains it more.

  The FBI's plan was even more bold. Rather than penetrate an existing encrypted phone company used by criminals, it would secretly start and market its own encrypted phone firm. While criminals used the devices, the FBI would be able to read what they were saying.

  The challenge was that running a fake encrypted phone company was not that different from running a real encrypted phone company.

  "We can't just run a good investigation; we have to run a good company,"

  ...

  It was essentially a problem of marketing, Young said. The FBI needed to imbue this fake company with credibility so that criminals would buy and use the phones.

Not their first real company, either. Once upon a time, the FBI created RHM Trust Bank.[0]

[0]https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2019/02/13/694549634/epis...

The FBI/CIA has a long history of doing this. I met a guy once who ran a fake pro shop in New York to spy on visiting Russians (in a part of town they were known to frequent) during the Cold War.

Sorry, what's a "pro shop"?

>A pro shop is a sporting-goods shop within a public or private-membership amateur sporting activities facility of some kind, most commonly a golf course, where it will typically be located in the country club building. In the case of golf pro shops, such stores usually provide equipment such as golf balls, clubs, shoes, and tees, as well as golf-themed gift items, and sometimes snacks or refreshments. Aside from golf courses, pro shops are also frequently found at bowling alleys, pool and snooker halls, tennis and racquetball courts, ice and roller hockey rinks, and football (soccer) facilities.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pro_shop

And then you hope they divulge their secrets while shopping for sports equipment?

I imagine it's a good "in" to learn about their social life, which can lead to secrets being divulged. If you know where and how often they play sports, it's probably not terribly hard to arrange for your colleague to bump into them at the golf course (or wherever) and try to strike up a friendship. It's not as if the spy agencies had cellphone GPS logs to track these guys, so the human element was important.

Even asking a regular customer, "Hey, what happened to Ivan? I haven't seen him around. Is he still in the area?" while they're shopping for sports equipment could be a conversation that provides valuable information about someone's whereabouts.

The meaning I know for that is essentially the store and sometimes a bit of a hangout spot associated with a golf course (so named because of the golf professional(s) available there). Not sure if there's other meanings.

Isn't that a golf shop? I didn't know it was popular in Russia.

Golf store that usually offers lessons, swing analysis, club fitting, etc.

They captured one of the distributors for a secure phone company they had already taken down. He was trying to start up his own secure messaging app so they basically funded him, added the backdoors, and used his network to market the new device. It's funny to think about but who would you trust more, some silicon valley company making a "secure" messaging app or one made by another criminal? It's not like there is a LinkedIn for international criminals so there's a physical network of trust required and this guy seemed to have had it.

Law enforcement agencies created a site to sell the phones, and then had informants and other such people "pass the word" in the targeted communities - "hey, there's this cool site where you can buy a phone that the FBI can't track!". Viral word of mouth marketing.

They probably were introduced into the criminals organisations by members who were “converted” and working as double agents for law enforcement?

One article at the time said they had an informant that convinced top level criminals to use it and it spread from there.

Will try to find it, but it was awhile back.

edit:

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2021/06/encrypted-messag...

> The operation came into being after the FBI took down a Canadian-based encryption service called Phantom Secure. Phantom Secure was marketing its services to criminal elements, offering secure communications through the encrypted cellphones that the company provided to syndicates. When the company was dismantled in 2018, the FBI sought to fill the void in the black market for secure criminal communications. To make that happen, the agency recruited a former distributor of Phantom Secure as an informant who, in return for reduced jail time, not only helped develop an encrypted communications system called ANOM, but helped market it to insular networks of criminal buyers.

Generally speaking, criminals aren't smart people. Otherwise they could probably use their intelligence to earn money through legitimate means

Street criminals tend to be dumb. Thugs, muggers, dealers, guys who just freak out and shoot/beat/rape someone for no reason. People like that usually aren't together enough to even think of getting a secure phone.

The FBI is after the upper echelons of organized crime, and organized crime can be terrifyingly intelligent and resourceful. As another commenter mentioned, some of the Mexican cartels have their own IT departments and private cell providers.

> organized crime can be terrifyingly intelligent and resourceful. As another commenter mentioned, some of the Mexican cartels have their own IT departments and private cell providers

What is that based on? If they are so smart, why are they in a business where they're risking their lives, living under constant legal threat, and ruining the lives of millions of others? Lots of people get very wealthy without those risks, such as many in the Bay Area? Who is smarter?

Having your own IT department isn't a sign of genius.

Intelligence != capable of socializing. You need both in order to be paid well. I think the belife that criminals are uninteligent is due to 1) Intelligent people recognizing that crime rarely has a positive expected profit

2) There might be more unintelligent people than people who are both intelligent and so incapable of socializing that they can't find work.

As long as you're not at the bottom 2-3 rungs crime can have a huge positive expected profit. It's the lifestyle that sucks which is why intelligent people don't get into it unless something in their life makes it a compelling option.

It's amazing to me to see how many people run out the tropes that intelligent people don't commit crimes. More accurately, intelligent people don't get caught committing crimes.

Aka https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias

I know a ton of intelligent people in their 30s or 40s at or near the poverty line. Being intelligent doesn't in any way guarantee you good money.

If you haven't heard of the just world fallacy, it might be worth looking into.

It doesn't guarantee it, but it sure helps! Thew world isn't perfectly just, but there is justice. It depends on you and me - are we making our immediate world more just?

There are plenty of smart criminals. They just don't get caught so you only hear about the dumb ones.

It's like inverted Survivorship Bias.

They're not exactly intelligent. I've recovered a drug dealers phone from my airbnb. They use signal and coded language to send messages back and forth, but don't put a lock screen on the phone and leave pictures of their product in gallery.

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