NEW YORK (AP) – The American secret service has found a huge network of “Sim Farms” in the New York region and quietly dismantles, just like world leaders gather for meetings in the United Nations.
Matt McCool, the special agent responsible for the New York Field Office of the Secret Service, said that agents found several sites filled with servers and stacked SIM cards, of which more than 100,000 cards were already active. Although the investigation is underway and no arrests have been made, he described it as a well-financed, highly organized company and possibly run by nation-state actors from certain countries.
Civil servants also warned of the damage that the network could have caused if it had remained intact. McCool compared the potential impact with the cellular blackouts that followed the attacks of September 11 and the Boston Marathon bombing, when networks collapsed under pressure.
So what are these Simboerderijen and what are they capable of?
What the technology does
SIM farms are hardware devices that can contain countless SIM cards from various mobile operators. These devices then operate voice -over internet protocol (VoIP) technology to send and receive bulk messages or calls.
Although initially developed for legitimate purposes, such as cheap international calling, the technology has become a cornerstone of organized fraud focused on massive public – phishing texts and scam calls.
“Scams have now become so advanced. Phishing -E -mails, texts, spoofing caller -id, all this technology gives scammers that ahead,” said Eva Velasquez, president and CEO of the Identity Theft Resource Center.
In this case, the devices were concentrated within 35 miles of the UN building. The research is underway, but McCool said that forensic analysis currently believes that the system could have been used to send encrypted messages to organized crime groups, cartels and terrorist organizations.
How these farms pose a threat to telecom networks
Anthony J. Ferrante, the global head of the cyber security practice at FTI, an international consultancy firm, said that the photos show a very advanced and established SIM farm that can be used for a number of snode activities, including the potential to overwhelming mobile networks with million phone calls.
“So if you can imagine that kind of size on mobile networks, it would just overwhelm them and make sure they are closed,” Ferrante said in an interview. He also notes that it is possible that the system can be used for surveillance activities, given the proximity of the United Nations, “that equipment may be used to intercept communication, communications or actually, to intercept clone devices.”
Ferrante, who previously served in important security positions in the White House and the FBI, says that he is waiting for the results of the investigation before he draws conclusions about the nature of the setup, but he emphasizes that the scale of the operation shows how simple tools can be real risks for critical infrastructure.
“The brains could have set this up a long time ago and operate from thousands of kilometers away,” he said. “It is a grim memory of how deeply connected to each other that our world has become, where local vulnerabilities can be used worldwide.”
