OAN Staff Blake Wolf
11:14 AM – Monday, June 30, 2025
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, the Sinaloa drug cartel reportedly employed a hacker to surveil FBI informants, with the intent of enabling targeted murders.
The federal report was released by the DoJ’s Office of the Inspector General. It detailed a 2018 plot by the Sinaloa Cartel to find, intimidate, and kill informants in Mexico City working on the case of cartel boss Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman — with help from an unnamed hacker.
However, the report does not reveal how many targeted individuals were intimidated or killed.
According to the newly released 47-page audit, the hacker was hired to “observe people going in and out of the United States Embassy in Mexico City and identify ‘people of interest’ for the cartel, including an FBI assistant legal attaché.”
The audit also revealed that the hacker would watch FBI informants’ every move through geolocation data from their cell phone, as well as monitoring any incoming and outgoing calls.
Furthermore, the hacker tapped into various surveillance cameras throughout Mexico City in order to identify any other individuals meeting up with the agent.
“The cartel used that information to intimidate and, in some instances, kill potential sources or cooperating witnesses,” the report stated.
The report detailed the current leadership of the Sinaloa cartel, as Guzman is currently serving a life sentence at a supermax prison in Colorado after being extradited to the U.S. in 2017.
“The cartels run a multi-billion-dollar global enterprise and utilize sophisticated technology to enhance their business operations,” stated Derek Maltz, the previous acting DEA administrator. “They utilize state-of-art sophisticated surveillance techniques to identify law enforcement activities and their adversaries.”
“Advances in data mining and analysis, facial recognition, and computer network exploitation have made it easier than ever for nation state adversaries, terrorist organizations and criminal networks to identify FBI personnel and operations.”
“Some within the FBI and partner agencies, such as the Central Intelligence Agency, have described this threat as ‘existential,’” the report added.
In response to the increased threat imposed by the Sinaloa cartel, the FBI has begun working toward a plan to mitigate potential vulnerabilities while increasing training for all current and future operations.
President Donald Trump previously designated the Sinaloa cartel as a terrorist organization earlier this year, as it is one of the most prominent traffickers of deadly drugs, such as fentanyl and heroin, being smuggled into the United States through the Mexican border.
The Sinaloa cartel have also been infamously known to “murder, kidnap, and intimidate civilians, government officials and journalists,” according to the U.S. State Department.
Guzman’s sons now lead a major faction within the Sinaloa cartel, prompting United States officials to offer a $10 million bounty for the capture of Archivaldo Ivan Guzman Salazar and Jesus Alfredo Guzman Salazar.
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