Somali piracy: More sophisticated than you thought | Hacker News Reader

Somali piracy: More sophisticated than you thought

economist.com

113 pointsmblakele37 comments

Somalia is actually very tech-savvy and entrepreneurial considering 20+ years without govt. Most services are provided by the private sector and NGOs. As there is no Central Bank, considerable amount of money comes into the country through transfers from the Somali diaspora. Somalis have disrupted disruption!

There are so many problems in this country and startups can definitely contribute to solving some of these problems. Piracy just like any other organised crime is sophisticated and has international players.

In case you are wondering, I am a Somali. And no, I am not a pirate.

Email me if you'd like to go over some ideas, I like such things. My address is in my profile. Cheers!

Seems like a market sector ripe for disruption! All those pirates have mobile phones, and soon they'll have smartphones -- what's going to be the Uber for piracy?

As a huge plus, visa law is fantastic in Somalia. Great place to bootstrap.

Let us know how you managed. :D

This is interesting, though I'm curious how basic or archaic did the author think their operations were? Did he assume it was a bunch of poor Somalis on handmade rafts going out there and hijacking boats?

Do most ships now employ private security onboard during their travels through that region?

Has anyone plotted a map that is public of piracy events worldwide? Would love to see a heatmap or something of it.

"Has anyone plotted a map that is public of piracy events worldwide? Would love to see a heatmap or something of it."

Try http://www.icc-ccs.org/piracy-reporting-centre/live-piracy-m...

Thanks for that link, really interesting stuff.

If you look at that map, Nigeria seems far more active 2013 then Somalia. Too bad it's only for 2013.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/10/23/opinion/international/a...

"Al Shabab has been terrific at stamping out piracy from its ports, due to its harsh interpretation of Shariah and the personal animus between profit-seeking pirates and Islamist militants.

[...]

"Now that Al Shabab is in retreat, the emerging power vacuum in Somalia’s southern ports may lead to ‘sweet-spot’ conditions for pirates to resurface."

Around Singapore surprised me as well. Reading a few reports they mostly robbing the crews valuables, I guess you wouldn't really have anywhere to take a hijacked ship in that area.

I was surprised by the startup nature of the thing -- investors, lawyers, etc.

The money laundering part seems obvious, since that happens with most criminal enterprises. But the business services around it really are analogous to legitimate operations.

> Do most ships now employ private security onboard during their travels through that region?

Over 30 different navies are now deployed in the region to secure trade and there is a huge joint operation there with a constant presence.

One taskforce is Combined Maritime Forces:

http://combinedmaritimeforces.com/about/

another force is called EU-NAVFOR:

http://eeas.europa.eu/csdp/missions-and-operations/eu-navfor...

Their operation is Atlanta:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Atalanta

Similarly you have US operations, South Korean, Australian, etc.

The problem is that the area is so vast and there is so much traffic there, Somalia is an almost ideally design pirate base. They can't protect all the traffic, and even with convoy systems (similar to what happen in the Atlantic and Mediterranean during WWII) ships still get picked off.

What has happen now is the type of target has changed. From large container ships to small pleasure craft, tourist vessels, smaller merchant ships, etc. That is why the average take has gone down. You will never be able to protect all ships throughout the entire area, it just isn't feasible.

If anybody is interested, the original report reference in the article is available on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Pirate-Trails-Tracking-Financial-Activ...

Since it is a World Bank report, it is likely available for free online if you search for it.

Many pleasure crafts avoid the area now by either going around the Cape of Good Hope, or by shipping their craft overland.

Looking forward to reading about a Somali YC for early stage pirate groups.

How can we disrupt incumbent piracy inefficiencies?

These jokes seem kind of tasteless when talking about armed gangs that hold people hostage and sometimes kill people.

Thank you for speaking up. After the second comment I thought I was the only one that thought this was madness.

I don't think I would have laughed audibly otherwise.

If you think like that about jokes, you'll have a hard time laughing at most of them.

Why does every article about somali pirates always bring up qat? It's popular in a lot of places and it's barely a narcotic, maybe half a step up from coffee. Do they think chewing qat is what is making them pirates?

Most places where it is illegal but popular don't even bother to enforce the ban.

Yeah, I was curious about this too. There did seem to be an over-emphasis in the article, for what I believed to be common and mild stimulant.

Elmore Leonard wrote "Djibouti" about the Somali pirate operations. He must have researched it pretty thoroughly because everything in the Economist article is in the book.

If you want a nice thriller and, at the same time, get some background into the pirate operations, give it a go. It's a great read.

Seems like it would be far easier to wage a brief naval campaign (using contractors, UAVs, and a naval quarantine) than to either continue suffering losses from piracy (both the ships lost and decreased trade), or to fix Somalia. Going after the money would probably cripple trade with Somalia even more than a board/search/execute policy on any ship leaving a 12nm exclusion zone with weapons.

Pompey managed it 2,000 years ago:

http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/pompey/qt/02411-Pompey-an...

Why is it a surprise that where there's money to be made there's smart, motivated, savvy, ruthless people trying to get in on the action?

Because they come from a poor African country. If you are from a poor African country and you do anything other than run a marathon, live in a mud hut, or contract HIV people in the West are shocked.

Between this and the recent stories of mass elephant poisonings and high-tech rhino/elephant poachers, I find it increasingly hard to relate with the "We should dampen our judgement of these people, because they are poor and their families are starving" argument.

I find it increasingly hard to relate with the "We should dampen our judgement of these people, because they are poor and their families are starving" argument.

Are you referring to Somali pirates or pirates in general?

I am not particularly aware of modern non-Somalian pirates.

Check out the piracy heat-map posted elsewhere in this thread.

Lots of piracy around Singapore/Malaysia, Ecuador/Colombia and Nigeria. The hits around Somalia probably account for about 10-15% of hits worldwide.

Did you try: http://www.icc-ccs.org/piracy-reporting-centre/live-piracy-m...

As you can see, there is a cluster off Nigeria related to the unrest in the Delta, and another around Singapore, which is a choke-point.

I understand that there are pirates elsewhere, let me rephrase: The only stories I regularly see about pirates are Somalian pirates, and the only times I have heard the "you should have some sympathy, they are poor and starving" line is in the context of stories about Somalian pirates. This story is about Somalian pirates. So yes, I am talking about Somalian pirates.

I believe a big reason Somalian pirates get coverage is because they have captured oil tankers (which the disruption of such shipping is obviously a huge concern), the ships they are capturing are both massive and carrying good destined for the US/Europe. I believe other pirates in other parts of the world tend to go for smaller ships and don't go for long drawn out ransoms since there's not too many places to safely stash a huge ship.

And ...

Do you "offen" as in frequently or "offen" as in one having no parents?

I see several potential products that are ready for an agile, Silicon Valley start-up with a forward-thinking MVP. I think the people who track the Qat consumption during a raid would pay a monthly subscription for a Qatulator (Qat Calculator).

Any other ideas?

Is there any money in pirate hunting? I would think not....

Bounty hunting, maybe ...

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