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DarkCyber for May 8, 2018, Now Available

This week’s story line up... A new facial recognition service from Verint’s Terrogence unit, streamlining fentanyl production, another successful Dark Web “seize and operate” operation by law enforcement, and a questionable solution to the FBI’s “going dark” problem.


Louisville, KY, USA – WEBWIRE

Stephen E Arnold said, “The profits generated by the sale of fentanyl are increasing interest in synthetic opioids. The availability of an intermediate compound which makes fentanyl fabrication in a Betty Crocker-type cake mix recipe is an ominous development. Restrictions on pharma companies are important but producers of intermediate compounds also require attention.”

DarkCyber for May 8, 2018, is now available at www.arnoldit.com/wordpress and on Vimeo at https://vimeo.com/268247100.

Stephen E Arnold’s DarkCyber is a weekly video news and analysis program about the Dark Web and lesser known Internet services.

Terrogence, a business unit of Verint, has developed a specialized image collection and search system. The focus is on identifying bad actors. Images are harvested from a wide range of sources, and the images are indexed. Verint also offers a robust FaceDetect system, which when combined with Verint’s other technologies and engineering capabilities provides a number of high-value functions for investigators. However, China has made significant advances in facial recognition as well. The key point is that real-time facial recognition technology has diffused around the world. No single country or region dominates this technical field. Although consumer applications of facial recognition technology are reducing flight boarding times, facial recognition is an amplifier for law enforcement. What once took days or weeks can now be accomplished in minutes or hours.

Chemistry majors know that fabricating a synthetic opioid, if not particularly complicated, requires time, expertise, and attention to detail. Bulk 4-ANPP can be acquired via transactions on the hidden Internet, shipped to a country (for example, Mexico), and then smuggled into the US. With this intermediate, street grade fentanyl can be manufactured quickly. Due to the small size of some fentanyl doses, drug orders can be sent via traditional package and letter delivery systems. Fentanyl is, ounce for ounce, significantly more profitable for drug dealers to handle.opioid More aggressive and stringent parcel per-screening may be needed to deal with this type of contraband.

Stephen E Arnold said, “The profits generated by the sale of fentanyl are increasing interest in synthetic opioids. The availability of an intermediate compound which makes fentanyl fabrication in a Betty Crocker-type cake mix recipe is an ominous development. Restrictions on pharma companies are important but producers of intermediate compounds also require attention.”

Since the ground breaking FBI PlayPen operation, a number of “seize and operate” stings have neutralized some bad actors. A recent operation in Ohio resulted in the arrest of bad actors who had in their possession more than 250,000 child pornography (CP) images and videos. Operation Pacifier was a success, resulting in the identification of 300 individuals, 55 of whom were hands-on child abusers. Despite the success of CP operations in the US and the UK, child sex abuse remains a serious, world-wide problem.

The final story describes an allegedly fool proof way to allow law enforcement to access encrypted messages. DarkCyber reports that the idea of solving two complicated problems is interesting. However, what a human has crafted can be solved by a human. The academic researchers’ proposed method is likely to be less useful than techniques developed by policeware vendors. DarkCyber believes than one large online vendor will be introducing capabilities which may be more useful to law enforcement. The patented method will be profiled in Stephen E Arnold’s “Deanonymizing Digital Currency Transactions at the Telestrategies ISS conference in Prague in June 2018.

About Stephen E Arnold

Stephen E Arnold is the author of “Dark Web Notebook” and “CyberOSINT: Next Generation Information Access.” This book describes some of the technologies used by GSR and Cambridge Analytica to acquire and analyze Facebook user data. He has been named as a technology adviser to the UK based Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Human Trafficking and Child Sex Abuse.” Mr. Arnold also lectures to law enforcement and intelligence professionals attending the Telestrategies ISS conferences in Prague, Washington, DC, and Panama City, Panama. In recent months, he has shared his research with law enforcement and intelligence professionals in the US and Europe. His most recent lectures focus on deanonymizing chat and digital currency transactions. One hour and full day programs are available via webinars and on-site presentations. He publishes the free Web log “Beyond Search,” which is available at www.arnoldit.com/wordpress .

 

 


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 Dark Web
 facial recognition
 deanonymization
 law enforcement
 fentanyl


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