A new AIs-heading technique to track grain smuggling
Bellingcat uses a new AIS-based technique to track Russia's "shadow fleet" smuggling grain stolen from Ukrainian ports to Libya, exposing how ships like the Grumant manipulate transmitters to evade sanctions.
Background
- Bellingcat is an open-source investigative outlet that uses publicly available data (satellite imagery, social media, shipping records) to expose war crimes, corruption, and smuggling.
- The "shadow fleet" refers to hundreds of aging, poorly insured tankers and cargo ships that Russia has assembled since 2022 to evade Western sanctions on its oil, and now grain exports. The vessels often disable their AIS (Automatic Identification System) transponders or broadcast fake locations to hide their movements.
- The article describes a new method: by cross-referencing satellite photos of a ship with its "missed" AIS pings that briefly broadcast a truthful location hours before going dark, analysts can reconstruct the vessel's actual route. This allows investigators to prove that grain loaded in Russian-occupied Ukrainian ports was illegally taken to Libya — a key transit hub for smuggled Russian goods bound for Africa and the Middle East.