
Feds Bust CEO Allegedly Selling Custom BlackBerry Phones to Sinaloa Drug Cartel - uiri
https://motherboard.vice.com/amp/en_us/article/a34b7b/phantom-secure-sinaloa-drug-cartel-encrypted-blackberry
======
sixtypoundhound
This line shocked me: “We made it—we made it specifically for this [drug
trafficking] too,” Ramos told undercover agents, according to a transcript
included in the complaint.

Rule #1 for managing products with grey-market applications: never acknowledge
the existence of the illegal market (or any activity that opens you to up to
material civil suits).

That instantly exposes you to all kinds of criminal and civil liability; the
fact an individual said it vs. "the company" likely makes you personally
liable as well, the corporate veil won't help you much here.

You're not making cheap guns for gang members to kill people with, you're
developing affordable security options for lower income citizens who are
exercising their 2nd amendment rights.

You're not creating tools that help criminals hide their past, you're helping
good people clear their record from legitimate mistakes and errors... or evade
privacy invading snoops... etc.

Always talk about the white hat applications, never the sinister ones...

~~~
ericjang
Out of curiosity - how do people who employ these marketing tactics reconcile
this? do they drink their own Kool-Aid or do they willfully turn a blind eye
to the grey/blackhat clients because they don't want to think about it?

~~~
1024core
You could, basically, say the same about guns. Guns kill 10s of 1000s of
people in the US each year. Any manufacturer who makes, for example, semi-
automatics and other military style weapons knows that it's for killing
people, not deer. But they still make them. Why? Ostensibly, due to the 2nd
Amendment.

So why doesn't the same apply to these phones vis-a-vis the 1st Amendement?
Sure, you could use the phone for drug transactions; but that's not what it
was designed to do; just like you _could_ use a car to carry drugs, but that's
not what it was designed for.

~~~
jjeaff
Plenty of hunting rifles are semi automatic. By "military style" do you mean
"black guns"? Because you can hunt with black rifles as well. And lots of
people simply like guns and have fun taking them out to the shooting range.
And they have absolutely zero intention or desire to shoot another human. And
by "lots" I mean the huge majority, most likely.

~~~
pembrook
I'm an avid hunter and have never known, seen, heard of, or even imagined
using an AR15 (for example) for hunting. Although I’m sure some people will
claim they do. The modern AR15 a semi-automatic "retail" version of a gun
designed to be optimally efficient at killing multiple humans in combat
scenarios.

And absolutely you're 100% correct. The vast majority of owners are law-
abiding and just enthusiasts who like customizing and shooting their semi-
neutered human killing tool at the range. Hey, I agree, the AR-15 is cool
looking and fun to shoot in "safe" environments.

However, humans are unpredictable, unreliable bags of irrational emotions. The
future is going to be marked by a steady removal of humans from things they
are unreliable and unsafe at doing (ie. driving, etc). If you think 100 years
from now Bob is going to be driving himself to the range to go shoot whatever
absurdly powerful handheld-railgun-type-instrument-of-death exists in the
future I'd say you're comedically on the wrong side of history.

~~~
jjeaff
You probably hunt big game then. AR-15s are very popular and fun for "varmint"
hunting. It is open season on wild hogs in several southern states right now
due to their invasion and subsequent overpopulation. And you really need a
semi-auto if you are going to take down several of them quickly when they run
in packs.

>humans are unpredictable, unreliable bags of irrational emotions

Ya, but not really. Death by mass shooting is so rare, like winning a big
jackpot in the lottery rare. There are so many opportunities for humans to
make mischief and commit violent acts day in and day out, yet they don't. The
only reason mass shootings get so much attention is because it is so rare.
Guns in America aren't going to go away anytime soon. 100 years in the future,
maybe, but with the advent of cheap 3d printers that can create firearms, and
the fact that there are simply so many firearms in the US already that will
essentially last forever with minimum upkeep, the future may be just as full
of guns as ever.

Not to mention there will likely always be a community of enthusiasts. Just
like 100 years ago, some people predicted no one would ever need to use horses
in the future, but today, millions of people have horses. As noted in another
HN article, today, there are more available models of fountain pen and ink
than ever before, even though fountain pens were obsoleted many years ago.

So yes, I think it is very likely that some people will drive themselves to a
shooting range with their vintage non-self driving car and shoot off some
rounds.

~~~
dmix
Not to mention the connection between mass shootings and AR-15's completely
falls apart unless you're looking exclusively as white kids in school and
factor in just how popular they are across the entire country. Including among
police.

------
michaelbuckbee
This has a lot of parallels to the guy arrested for making secret compartments
in cars. The compartments weren’t specifically for anything illegal but close
enough.

[https://www.wired.com/2013/03/alfred-
anaya/](https://www.wired.com/2013/03/alfred-anaya/)

~~~
sah2ed
Alfred Anaya's conviction is quite a story. He really got the book thrown at
him and then some, while much bigger fish in the drug trade got half of his 24
year sentence because they opted to bargain with the government.

Thanks for the link.

------
derefr
Yesterday I was pondering what the ultimate “side-piece” phone would be (that
is, a secondary phone you use for OPSEC when leading a second life.)

Unlike a burner phone, you wouldn’t constantly be throwing it away (just
getting new SIMs every once in a while) so cheapness would not be the #1
priority—but it _would_ still be #2 or #3, since this is still a whole 'nother
phone you have in addition to the phone you usually use. And you’d want it to
be ergonomic to text on, so a 1990s candybar dumbphone wouldn’t quite cut it.
It wouldn’t need apps like a modern smartphone (other than maybe messaging
apps.) And battery life would be important—it's often hard to find private
time to charge a secret phone—so a big screen would be a drawback, not a
positive.

Ultimately, I figured that an old Blackberry would be perfect for this use-
case. Guess I deduced correctly.

~~~
closeparen
Both the SIM and the phone's serial number are available to the network. An
analyst looking to correlate your activities can do so trivially. In fact,
this is how Italian investigators were able to prove the link between a CIA
cell and the American embassy. No one used the same SIM to talk to both
groups, but they did use the same phone.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwGsr3SzCZc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwGsr3SzCZc)

~~~
derefr
Yes, sure, the IMEI is accessible; this is why I referred to it as a "side-
piece phone" rather than a "burner phone." They're separate OPSEC profiles:
evading a state attacker, vs. anonymizing some of your traffic from the view
of a private individual attacker (e.g. your spouse.)

~~~
mseebach
Step 0 is to correctly identify the threat model. If you're just hiding an
affair from your spouse, any old smartphone on a prepaid contract will do.

------
chrisbennet
I wonder if they will give fine the perp and give him deferred prosecution if
he promises not to do it again.

[https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/hsbc-holdings-plc-and-hsbc-
ba...](https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/hsbc-holdings-plc-and-hsbc-bank-usa-na-
admit-anti-money-laundering-and-sanctions-violations)

~~~
jakevn
A recommended read for anyone looking to find out more about the near-immunity
that the corporate elite enjoy:

The Chickenshit Club: Why the Justice Department Fails to Prosecute Executives

~~~
woolvalley
By executive do they mean big co executive? The pattern with most regulators &
prosecutors is they go after the easy to prosecute. If your hard to prosecute
then they stop doing it because it doesn't look good for their career numbers.

~~~
jakevn
Yes, sorry, that is what I meant by "corporate elite".

I'm not so sure it applies in this case as I don't really see the corp in
question as being big (relatively speaking).

To your point, this is basically what the book covers. It is the logical
conclusion of both fiduciary duty and the overwhelming effect that strong
legal representation has on the justice system. At this extreme, the legal
representation outright prevents prosecution instead of simply affecting the
outcome.

------
mattnewport
I'm still unclear from the article what the actual alleged crime is here? They
sold a product that was not illegal to perform a function (encrypted
communication) that is not (yet) illegal but it is alleged it was used to
arrange illegal activity by a third party?

Ford's CEO isn't arrested when a mustang is used as a getaway car in a bank
robbery, even though speed and acceleration are features they sell the product
on that are clearly useful to an escaping bank robber. McDonald's CEO isn't
arrested when a cartel hitman eats a Big Mac while waiting outside his
target's house. When exactly is the line crossed? Is it when explaining how
the features of the product are useful to a client who intends to engage in
illegal activity?

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _what [is] the actual alleged crime...here?_

“Attempt and conspiracy to import and distribute controlled substances” and
“obstruction,” according to the complaint [1]. Creating an encrypted phone is
probably legal. Creating an encrypted phone for drug traffickers is not.
Intent matters to the law.

[1] [https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4406486-Vincent-
Ramo...](https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4406486-Vincent-Ramos-
Complaint.html)

 _Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer. This is not legal advice._

~~~
mattnewport
One of the other comments in the thread linked that original complaint and
yeah it makes the whole thing look even more dubious than the original article
did. The evidence presented there seems extremely weak and it will be
interesting to see if these charges stick. Clearly law enforcement hates
private communications and are trying to put the pressure on companies that
provide them on the basis of highly questionable entrapment efforts and
tenuous evidence.

This case really highlights how destructive the drug war has been to
individual rights. When you have a victimless 'crime' like this where all
parties to the transactions are willing participants and there is no victim to
complain to law enforcement then the only way for charges to be brought is
entrapment, oppressive surveillance or encroaching on fourth amendment rights.
The logical progression is to attack parties providing otherwise completely
legitimate and legal private and secure communications.

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _When you have a victimless 'crime' like this_

Consider two knife makers. One sells cooking knives. The other sells similar
knives and tells people they're designed for stabbing. (The handles may be
made so lifting prints off them is intentionally difficult.) Two stabbings
happen, one with each of their knives. The government may have a case against
the latter knife maker in being party to the crime.

Trafficking drugs is illegal. (It is also far from victimless.) If you
intentionally make devices to aid drug traffickers, and then confess that to a
federal agent, the government probably has a case. I say all this as someone
who believes in de-criminalising most recreational drugs.

 _Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer. This is not legal advice._

~~~
mattnewport
Both knives designed for stabbing people and guns and bullets designed for
shooting people exist and are sold in the US and I'm not aware of their
manufacturers or retailers generally being held liable when they are used to
commit crimes. I don't think your analogy holds.

Selling drugs is victimless in the sense that there is no legal ''victim"
bringing a complaint - both the seller and the buyer are generally willing
participants in the transaction. This is why so many drug prosecutions must
rely on stings, undercover cops, informants, surveillance, etc. This is not to
say that nobody suffers any harm as a result of the drug trade.

In this particular complaint there is no victim and all the evidence comes
from undercover cops and informants.

~~~
amdavidson
While there are certainly guns that are suitable for shooting people, have you
seen a gun manufacturer advertise its products as being suitable for any
illegal purpose?

They are extremely careful with their marketing language, and I have never
seen any reference to shooting another person without it being heavily couched
in castle doctrine / home defense language. They're not out there marketing
their wares as being better for hitmen.

------
msh
They don’t seem to be the brightest criminals:

Multiple undercover agents, posing as drug traffickers looking to expand their
operations, also met Ramos in Las Vegas in February 2017, the complaint
continues.

“We made it—we made it specifically for this [drug trafficking] too,” Ramos
told undercover agents, according to a transcript included in the complaint.

~~~
pessimizer
I don't think they actually said the part in the brackets. It's an editorial
insertion, and probably from the person who wrote this article rather than
from the transcript being quoted.

~~~
natrik
“We made it—we made it specifically for this shit too,”

probably said something like that

~~~
dsfyu404ed
So basically "our product is specifically designed for your application,
please give us your money"?

Yeah, because people never stretch the truth when trying to make a sale

~~~
TeMPOraL
Stretching the truth should have consequences too.

------
joering2
Recently I decided to have some fun "going dark" with my phone update. I
wonder how far I got:

\- I purchased iPhone8 from the store using cash. I gave fake name to print
out receipt.

\- I purchased empty sim card from eBay with cash at $5 value

\- Finally on my way back, I picked up $500 pre-paid card from Wallmart. The
lady at checkout wanted my ID because as she said "the purchase is over $500
with cash" (I had few other items) but I complained that this is BS and she
probably doesn't like my accent, and she let me go without authentication.

\- I brought all this home when I have whole house covered with VPN from one
of top 5 VPN providers (altho I connect thru USA - any connection from outside
makes life much more complicated, like multiple verification screens etc)

\- The sim card company website gave me some issues using prepaid card; but as
I remembered that gift cards should not be used for ongoing charges, I just
unchecked "autopay every month" and it went thru.

\- I registered mail.com email address without phone # or optional recovery
email

\- I fired up new iPhone with new empty sim card. I went thru setup process
using new email. Here it was harder. iTunes did not like my prepaid card. I
had to use my VOIP app (not Google, an app I use from Netherlands) to call
iTunes and complain. I think it was a matter of one flag because it took them
five seconds. I had verified complete iTunes account with valid payment method
on it.

\- Of course I turned off as much localization/icloud/blahblah stuff I could

\- I decided not to use my new phone and new number for incoming or outgoing
numbers due to number matching techniques "they" use; instead I use a VOIP app
to call my people.

\- I did sign up to my regular mailbox but did it from BlueMail iPhone app,
not the native one.

I wonder how hard it will be or how long it will take "them" to match me
back...

Edit: altho this is my last "iteration" with regular phone. NExt one on my
list is [https://www.silentcircle.com/](https://www.silentcircle.com/)

~~~
StudentStuff
> I purchased iPhone8 from the store using cash. I gave fake name to print out
> receipt.

Did you buy this from the Apple store? What precautions were taken to avoid
their obvious & hidden cameras

> I purchased empty sim card from eBay with cash at $5 value

Now the dealer you bought said SIM from has your name, address, and email,
plus some card details from PayPal.

> Finally on my way back, I picked up $500 pre-paid card from Wallmart. The
> lady at checkout wanted my ID because as she said "the purchase is over $500
> with cash" (I had few other items) but I complained that this is BS and she
> probably doesn't like my accent, and she let me go without authentication.

Uhh, Walmart shares their security camera feeds with multiple private
companies: [http://fortune.com/2015/11/09/wal-mart-facial-
recognition/](http://fortune.com/2015/11/09/wal-mart-facial-recognition/)

They may also be sharing them with law enforcement.

> I brought all this home when I have whole house covered with VPN from one of
> top 5 VPN providers (altho I connect thru USA - any connection from outside
> makes life much more complicated, like multiple verification screens etc)

So now your VPN provider is a failure point, as they can totally screw you
over: [https://invisibler.com/lulzsec-and-
hidemyass/](https://invisibler.com/lulzsec-and-hidemyass/)

Use Tor if you want (as close as your going to get to) bulletproof anonymity.
Youtube even works over Tor!

> The sim card company website gave me some issues using prepaid card; but as
> I remembered that gift cards should not be used for ongoing charges, I just
> unchecked "autopay every month" and it went thru.

The cell carrier and anyone interested can do a Home Location Register lookup
(aka HLR) and find out which tower and cell your phone is registered on. Worse
yet, your carrier or MVNO can use certain E911 features to locate your phone
down to a few hundred feet.

> I fired up new iPhone with new empty sim card. I went thru setup process
> using new email. Here it was harder. iTunes did not like my prepaid card. I
> had to use my VOIP app (not Google, an app I use from Netherlands) to call
> iTunes and complain. I think it was a matter of one flag because it took
> them five seconds. I had verified complete iTunes account with valid payment
> method on it.

Don't bet on the country of origin to protect you. Most VOIP providers do jack
to protect your calls even part of the way in transit, and that call was
definitely intercepted since it came a provider overseas:
[http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/16/politics/bush-lets-us-
spy-...](http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/16/politics/bush-lets-us-spy-on-
callers-without-courts.html)

> Of course I turned off as much localization/icloud/blahblah stuff I could

Not that this will save you, these are essentially "user comfort" toggles that
turn off features, but don't stop the data your looking to protect from
leaking. Intel and AMD both do this too with Computrace and their various
management engine implementations.

\- I decided not to use my new phone and new number for incoming or outgoing
numbers due to number matching techniques "they" use; instead I use a VOIP app
to call my people.

So back to my prior point, since you picked a foreign VOIP carrier, your
ensuring the NSA has all of your calls recorded!

\- I did sign up to my regular mailbox but did it from BlueMail iPhone app,
not the native one.

Apple puts much more of an emphasis on end user security than nearly any other
company, which is part of why Siri is still garbage and their neural
network/AI based offerings all center on operating on device. The built in
mail app is likely more secure than BlueMail.

~~~
joering2
> Did you buy this from the Apple store? What precautions were taken to avoid
> their obvious & hidden cameras

Apple store. Wear hat and somewhat darkening glasses.

> Now the dealer you bought said SIM

Sorry I mean BestBuy... you cant buy stuff from ebay with cash.

> Uhh, Walmart shares their security camera feeds with multiple private
> companies

Same story.. hat and somewhat dark glasses.

Thanks for other info, very informative!

------
gerhardi
So it seems that there would be a good market for simple secure handheld
devices straight from the factory... Why are these shady custom shops
necessary for this?

~~~
wmf
So how's the Blackphone doing lately? It looks like they don't want to sell to
the general public now.

~~~
k_sh
They seem to still be popular over at the DoD.

------
_tulpa
Same article, but the non-AMP link:
[https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/a34b7b/phantom-
se...](https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/a34b7b/phantom-secure-
sinaloa-drug-cartel-encrypted-blackberry)

------
gagabity
Raises a lot of questions, how is PGP more secure than your normal EndToEnd
Encrypted messenger? Why are the Feds afraid of one but not the other?

~~~
lettuce
PGP might be easier to clone (duplicate private/master keys?) without tipping
off the other party like many end-to-end messengers do when you switch
devices.

 _B told Justice Janice Dillon that he sent a message to Kim on a Blackberry
that had been cloned from one belonging to the UN associate._

[http://vancouversun.com/news/crime/former-gangster-says-
dhak...](http://vancouversun.com/news/crime/former-gangster-says-dhak-
contracted-un-to-kill-enemies)

------
gagabity
Interesting that they remove the camera and mic.

~~~
blattimwind
Camera, built-in mic and accelerometer are the first and most important bits
you want to lose.

~~~
comboy
Right, now imagine you are the NSA. And you have access to tons of android
devices. If you filter out those which surprisingly don't seem to have these
parts - now these are interesting for sure.

~~~
tritium
Feature phones that run android will lack an accelerometer, might lack a
camera, but any phone without a microphone would certainly be strange.

Nonetheless, there's nothing preventing a system bus from reporting that a
virtual device exists, even if there's no physical hardware to match. Besides,
as soon as you plug a headset into the audio jack, the microphone becomes
available.

~~~
comboy
You can reason about what kind of device is this and in general basically look
for statistical patterns. Which is what they seem to be pretty good at. If you
have modified device then it's likely that you are an outlier.

~~~
throwaway2048
I doubt all devices are constantly reporting their capabilities to the NSA so
they can look for outliers.

~~~
comboy
Well I'm only thinking for a few seconds before writing a comment and they
have some pretty smart heads working full time, but you could imagine
compromising infrastructure of some popular app and adding your shiny bits
there. The famous black box of radio also has some pretty decent hardware
access. Gemalto sim cards hack etc.

When you help with some specific operation like drug trafficking you can
probably limit amount of devices that you need to monitor by location. Then
maybe deploy some zero cheaper zerodays there (or fivehundreddays, not
everybody cares about the updates).

I agree that this is kind of paranoid talk. Maybe removing these parts does
indeed help. If it does though, then I definitely wouldn't want to provide
info about these modifications to the press.

------
908087
Vice appears to be acting as an FBI propaganda outlet these days if this
article is any indication. The way they imply that producing devices for
privacy conscious users is "shady" made my skin crawl.

------
2_listerine_pls
If they really cared about drugs:

\- They could have stopped Afghan opium farmers.

\- They could use airborne spectrometry to detect Colombian/Mexican crops.

\- They could map out possible drug dealers in American land using their phone
patterns alone.

------
pg_bot
IANAL however I read through the affidavit and while I agree that they had
probable cause to arrest the CEO I don't believe this case is a slam dunk. A
fairly competent defense attorney should be able to convincingly claim that
the firm was incidental to any crimes committed. Mr Ramos certainly didn't do
himself any favors, but this isn't an open and shut case by any means.

------
netrap
Weirdly, I'm curious if there are others selling phones like this legally? I
guess Blackphone is one.

------
mr_spothawk
the purpose of the phones is so that nobody can intercept details and
eavesdrop on you, and the CEO is getting taken down for ... "drugs".

------
saas_co_de
This is what happens when you refuse to backdoor your devices for the US
government.

~~~
FLUX-YOU
Really? That's the problem you see here?

