Opinion

Deadly cartels know where our border agents live. We have to protect their families

Commercial data and surveillance cameras help identify sources and cooperating witnesses

By Todd Lyons Fox News

Published October 1, 2026 5:00am EDT

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A hacker working for the Sinaloa cartel identified an FBI assistant legal attaché in Mexico City. According to Reuters covering a Justice Department inspector general report released in June 2025, the hacker used the official's phone number to obtain call records and location data. The hacker then used Mexico City's camera network to follow the official around the capital and identify the people they met. The report says the cartel used that information to intimidate potential sources and cooperating witnesses and, in some cases, to kill them.

The deadly lesson was clear: our adversaries no longer need to physically surveil their targets. The commercial data economy does much of the work for them.

In an updated audit released last week, the Department of Justice (DOJ) Inspector General highlighted that this threat — ubiquitous technical surveillance or UTS — "continue[s] to affect the Department" and determined that "DOJ had no common definition of UTS and was not otherwise well-coordinated on the issue, few of the Department's components had taken action to mitigate the UTS threat, and UTS-specific training was lacking."

FBI INVESTIGATES AFTER SHINYHUNTERS HACKERS........

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