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  • Massive Illegal Cigarette Factory Dismantled in Italy

    Italian police, acting on a request from the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO), have dismantled a clandestine cigarette factory in northern Italy capable of producing four million cigarettes a day, authorities said.

    During the raid near Verona, which involved more than 70 officers, police arrested 13 people, including 11 Bulgarian and Ukrainian nationals found working inside and the facility’s two Italian owners. The suspects face charges of smuggling and trademark counterfeiting.

    Authorities confiscated the 2-million-euro facility along with 25 tonnes of illicit tobacco products. According to the EPPO, if the confiscated cigarettes had reached the black market, it would have resulted in an annual profit that would exceed 240 million euros ($275.5 million) as well as 3.9 million euro ($4.5 million) revenue loss for European Union and national budgets.

  • Patients harmed as Covid pandemic brought NHS close to collapse, inquiry finds

    Third report into the pandemic says patients and staff were failed as health service only just coped.

  • Armenia Targets Independent Editor in Widening Crackdown Ahead of Elections

    Escalating fears of a crackdown on press freedom ahead of national parliamentary elections, Armenian authorities summoned the top editor of a prominent independent newspaper for questioning over accusations that she called for a violent overthrow of the government.

    Armine Ohanyan, the editor-in-chief of the independent newspaper Hraparak, was interrogated on by the country’s Investigative Committee over an editorial she wrote in December 2024. Following the questioning, she was compelled to sign a non-disclosure agreement, according to her publication.

    The investigation centers on Article 422 of the Armenian Criminal Code, a statute that criminalizes public calls for the seizure of power, the breach of territorial integrity, or the violent overthrow of the constitutional order. If formally charged and convicted, Ohanyan faces between two and five years in prison.

    The move has sent a chill through the country’s opposition and independent media corps. Hraparak, which has been a persistent critic of the government, characterized the probe as a politically motivated assault designed to muzzle dissent before voters head to the polls.

    “Article 422 has become a lifeline for the government and is now a primary tool for political persecution,” the newspaper said in a statement. The publication noted that rumors had circulated for months that law enforcement agencies planned to target “several editors of free media outlets on the eve of the elections.”

    The summons drew swift condemnation from political figures, who warned that the ruling party was weaponizing the justice system to neutralize its critics. Mane Tandilyan, a former minister of labor and social affairs, accused the government of dragging up old writings to manufacture a crisis.

    “Material written years ago is suddenly being turned into a subject of a criminal case,” Tandilyan said, arguing that the law enforcement apparatus is being appropriated “to silence the speech of the opposition.”

    She warned that the government’s actions were inflicting profound damage on the country’s democratic institutions.

    “These fears of power have an irreparable impact on our society and, in this case, on the right to free speech,” Tandilyan said. “This is a consistent attempt to restrict free expression by labeling its manifestations as ‘public calls to seize power and overthrow the constitutional order.’”

  • Pluralistic: Love of corporate bullshit is correlated with bad judgment (19 Mar 2026)

    Today’s links

    • Love of corporate bullshit is correlated with bad judgment: Synergizing the strategic inflection points on the global data network.
    • Hey look at this: Delights to delectate.
    • Object permanence: Bluetooth headsets; Fruit sticker decoder; iPod batteries v DRM; Bruces’s SXSW keynote; Piracy isn’t funding terrorism; Hope v optimism; Identical twin time-travel prank; Prisoners draw corporate crooks; Spanish junkbots; Sheriff’s rape-kit denial; Non-dorky magic; Poetic bureaucrat mourns wolf; SXSW v MPAA; “Burning Days”; NYT paywall; Police rap-battle warning; Unions de-risk labor; “Murder the Truth”
    • Upcoming appearances: Where to find me.
    • Recent appearances: Where I’ve been.
    • Latest books: You keep readin’ em, I’ll keep writin’ ’em.
    • Upcoming books: Like I said, I’ll keep writin’ ’em.
    • Colophon: All the rest.


    A bearded man's cross-sectioned head, upside down, the skull flipped open; his brain is falling onto a tabriz rug below. His visible eye is wide and orange. The background is murky, green-tinted folds of a brain.

    Love of corporate bullshit is correlated with bad judgment (permalink)

    I’m a writer, so of course I care about words! But I’m a writer, so I also think that words are improved by their malleability, duality and nuance.

    This is one of the things I love about being a native English speaker – this glorious mongrel language of ours is full of extremely weird words, like “cleave,” which means its own opposite (“to join together” and “to cut apart”). English is full of these words that mean their own opposite, from “dust” to “oversight” to “weather”:

    https://www.mentalfloss.com/language/words/25-words-are-their-own-opposites

    This is what you get when you let a language run wild, with meaning determined (and contested) by speakers. Not for nothing, my second language is Yiddish, another glorious higgeldy-piggeldy of a tongue with no authoritative oversight and innumerable dialects.

    Semantic drift is a feature, not a bug. It’s how we get new words, and new meanings for old words. I love semantic drift! I mean, I’d better, since, having coined “enshittification,” I’m now destined to have a poop emoji on my headstone. Having coined a word – and having proposed a precise technical meaning for it – I am baffled by people who make it their business to scold others for using enshittification “incorrectly.” “Enshittification” is less than five years old, and we know when and how it was invented. If you like it when I make up a word, you can’t categorically object to other people making up new meanings for this word. I didn’t need a word-coining license to come up with enshittification, and you don’t need a semantic drift license to use it to mean something else.

    I wrote a whole danged essay about this, but still, hardly a day goes by without someone trying to enlist me in their project to scold and shame strangers for using the word incorrectly:

    The fact that a neologism is sometimes decoupled from its theoretical underpinnings and is used colloquially is a feature, not a bug. Many people apply the term “enshittification” very loosely indeed, to mean “something that is bad,” without bothering to learn – or apply – the theoretical framework. This is good. This is what it means for a term to enter the lexicon: it takes on a life of its own. If 10,000,000 people use “enshittification” loosely and inspire 10% of their number to look up the longer, more theoretical work I’ve done on it, that is one million normies who have been sucked into a discourse that used to live exclusively in the world of the most wonkish and obscure practitioners. The only way to maintain a precise, theoretically grounded use of a term is to confine its usage to a small group of largely irrelevant insiders. Policing the use of “enshittification” is worse than a self-limiting move – it would be a self-inflicted wound.

    https://pluralistic.net/2024/10/14/pearl-clutching/#this-toilet-has-no-central-nervous-system

    Colloquialization doesn’t dilute language, it thickens it. Using a powerful word to describe something else can be glorious. It’s allusion, metaphor, simile. It’s poesie. It’s fine. Bemoaning the “tsunami” of bad news doesn’t cheapen the deaths of people who die in real tsunamis. Saying that the Trump administration “nuked” the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau doesn’t desecrate the dead of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Calling creeping authoritarianism a “cancer” doesn’t denigrate the suffering of people who have actual cancer.

    What’s more, devoting your energies to “correcting” other people’s allusive language makes you a boring, tedious person. Sure, you can have a conversation with a comrade about making inclusive word choices, but interrupting a substantive debate to have that discussion is unserious. The words people use matter (I care a lot about words!) but they matter less than the things people mean. Keep your eye on the prize (metaphorically) (for avoidance of doubt, there is no prize) (both the prize and the eye are metaphors).

    (By all means, get angry at people who intentionally use slurs. None of this is to say that you should tolerate – or be subjected to – language that is intended to dehumanize you.)

    It’s time we admitted that it’s no good replacing an offensive term with a phrase that no one understands. Calling it “child sexual abuse material” is a good idea, but no one actually calls it that. The customary phrase is actually “child sexual abuse material, which most people call ‘child porn,’ but which we should really call ‘child sex abuse material.’” If your goal is to avoid saying “child porn” (a laudable goal!), this isn’t achieving it.

    None of this means that I am immune to being rubbed up the wrong way by other people’s language choices. Having been mentored by the science fiction great Damon Knight, I have been infected by many of his linguistic peccadillos, which means that if you say “out loud” in my earshot, I will (mentally) “correct” it to “aloud” (yes, “out loud” is fine, but Damon had a thing about it and it got stuck in my brain).

    I am especially perturbed by “business English,” the language of the commercial class, their cheerleaders in the press, and (alas) many of their critics. Anytime someone refers to a sector as a “space” (as in “I’m really getting into the AI space”) it’s like they’re making me chew tinfoil. Superlatives like “thought-leader” are so self-parodying I have to check every time someone utters one aloud (see?) to verify that they’re not being sarcastic. Objects of derision should be referred to by their surnames, not their given names (“Musk” is vituperative, “Elon” is friendly – though, thanks to the glorious and thickening contradictions of language, calling someone by their surname can also be affectionate). I steer clear of jargon used by firms to lionize themselves, like “hyperscaler.”

    I share the impulse to impose my linguistic preferences on the people around me. I just (mostly) suppress that impulse and try to focus on substance rather than style, at least when I’m trying to understand others and be understood by them. But yes, I do silently judge the people around me for their word choices – all the time.

    That’s why I immediately pounced on “The Corporate Bullshit Receptivity Scale: Development, validation, and associations with workplace outcomes,” an open access paper in the Feb 2026 edition of Personality and Individual Differences by Shane Littrell, a linguistics postdoc at Cornell:

    https://www.researchgate.net/publication/400597536_The_Corporate_Bullshit_Receptivity_Scale_Development_validation_and_associations_with_workplace_outcomes

    Littrell set out to evaluate “corporate bullshit,” a linguistic category that is separate from mere “jargon.” Jargon, Littrell writes, is a professional vocabulary that serves a useful purpose: “facilitat[ing] communication and social bonding, increas[ing] fluency, and help[ing] reinforce a shared identity among in-group members.”

    Bullshit, meanwhile, is “semantically, logically, or epistemically dubious information that is misleadingly impressive, important, informative, or otherwise engaging.” There’s a whole field of bullshit studies, with investigations into such exciting topics as “pseudo-profound bullshit” (think: Deepak Chopra).

    Littrell borrows from that field and others to investigate corporate bullshit, formulating a measurement index he calls the “Corporate Bullshit Receptivity Scale.” In a series of three experiments, Littrell sets out to determine who is the most susceptible to corporate bullshit, and what the correlates of that receptivity are.

    Littrell concludes that corporate bullshitters themselves are pretty good at identifying bullshit (they have a high “Organizational Bullshit Perception Score”). In other words, bullshitters know that they’re bullshitting. When a corporate leader declares that:

    This synergistic look at our thought leadership will ensure that we are decontenting and avoiding reputational deficits with our key takeaways as effectively as we can in order to sunset our resonating focus.

    they know it’s nonsense.

    This reminded me of the idea that cult leaders tell obvious lies to their followers as a way of forcing them to demonstrate their subservience. When Trump demands that his followers wear clown shoes:

    https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-is-obsessed-with-these-145-shoes-and-won-t-let-anyone-leave-without-a-pair/ar-AA1XOEBm

    Or that they pretend that “mutilization” is a word:

    https://www.wonkette.com/p/is-trumps-save-america-fck-america

    He’s engaging in a dominance play that forces his feuding princelings and their lickspittles to humiliate themselves and reaffirm his supremacy.

    There are plenty of rank-and-file workers inside corporations who have high OBPSes and know when they’re being bullshitted, but Littrell also identifies a large cohort of low-OBPS workers who are absolutely taken in by corporate bullshit.

    Here we get to a fascinating dichotomy. Both the low-OBPS and high-OBPS workers can be described as being “open minded,” but “open” has a very different meaning for each group. Workers who are good at spotting bullshit score high on open-mindedness metrics like “willingness to engage” and “willingness to reflect,” both characteristic of the “fluid intelligence” that makes workers good at solving problems and doing a good job.

    Meanwhile, workers who are taken in by bullshit are “open minded” in the sense that they are bad at analytical reasoning and thus easily convinced. These people test poorly on metrics like “logical reasoning” and “decision-making,” and score high on “overconfidence in one’s intellectual and analytic abilities.” They are apt to make blunders that “expose organizations to financial, reputational, or legal risks.”

    But they’re also exactly the workers who score high on “job satisfaction,” “trust in one’s supervisor,” and “degree to which they are inspired by corporate mission statements.” These people are so open minded that their brains start to leak out of their ears. Or, as Carly Page put it in The Register: “jargon sticks around not just because executives enjoy using it, but because many people respond to it as if it were genuine insight”:

    https://www.theregister.com/2026/03/15/corporate_jargon_research/

    This creates a feedback loop where bosses get rewarded for using empty and maddening phrases, and their workforce gets progressively more skewed towards people who are bad at spotting bullshit and at exercising their judgment on the job. It’s quite a neat – and ugly – explanation of why bullshit proliferates within organizations, and how organizations come to be completely overrun with bullshit.

    This is a fascinating research paper, and while I’ve focused on its conclusions, I really suggest going and reading about the methodology, especially the tables of “corporate bullshit” phrases they generated for their experiments (Tables 1, 2 and 3). This is some eldritch horror bullshit:

    By solving the pain point of customers with our conversations, we will ideate a renewed level of end-state vision and growth-mindset in the market between us and others who are architecting to download on a similar balanced scorecard.

    What’s more, these are all based on real examples of corporate bullshit from leaders at large corporations, with a few words rotated to synonyms drawn from the business-press.

    I’m a writer. I really do care about language. Sure, I get frustrated with scolds who rail against semantic drift or engage in petty, pedantic corrections, but not because words don’t matter. They matter, a lot. But language isn’t math (which is why double negatives are intensifiers, not negators). It can obscure (as with bullshit) or it can enlighten (as with poesie) or it can enable precision (as with jargon). Arguments about language matter, but what matters about them isn’t subjective aesthetics, nor is it a peevish obsession with “correctness.” What matters is the way that language operates on the world (and vice versa).

    Hey look at this (permalink)


    A shelf of leatherbound history books with a gilt-stamped series title, 'The World's Famous Events.'

    Object permanence (permalink)

    #20yrsago Eighth graders build giant awesome gymnasium rollercoaster https://web.archive.org/web/20060329110502/https://www.sgvtribune.com/news/ci_3606933

    #20yrsago Bluetooth headset combined with headphones https://www.techdigest.tv/2006/03/itech_clip_m_1.html

    #20yrsago HOWTO decode the sticker-numbers on fruit https://megnut.com/2006/03/14/read-the-numbers-on-your-fruit/

    #20yrsago DRM shortens iPod battery life https://web.archive.org/web/20060319201837/http://www.mp3.com/features/stories/3646.html

    #20yrsago McD’s employees’ secret recipes for improvised meals https://mcdonalds-talk.livejournal.com/158400.html

    #20yrsago UK to US: we’ll only buy open-source fighter jets https://web.archive.org/web/20060420192203/https://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2152035/joint-strike-fighter

    #20yrsago Bruce Sterling’s SXSW keynote MP3 https://web.archive.org/web/20060330072143/https://server1.sxsw.com/2006/coverage/SXSW06.INT.20060314.BruceSterling.mp3

    #20yrsago UK Open University opens its courseware https://web.archive.org/web/20060610125235/https://oci.open.ac.uk/

    #20yrsago Europe seeking to make open mapping impossible – help! https://web.archive.org/web/20060503172457/https://publicgeodata.org/Open_Letter

    #20yrsago MPAA rep gets slammed at SXSW https://www.powazek.com/2006/03/000571.html

    #20yrsago Canadian recording industry: P2P isn’t bad for business https://web.archive.org/web/20060408232202/https://www.michaelgeist.ca/component/option,com_content/task,view/id,1168/Itemid,85/nsub,/

    #15yrsago First-person account from surgeon who removed his own appendix https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/03/antarctica-1961-a-soviet-surgeon-has-to-remove-his-own-appendix/72445/

    #15yrsago New York Times paywall: wishful thinking or just crazy? https://memex.craphound.com/2011/03/17/new-york-times-paywall-wishful-thinking-or-just-crazy/

    #15rsago Android app pwns cardkey entry systems, opens all the locks https://web.archive.org/web/20110317132608/http://www.cybersecurityguy.com/caribou.html

    #15yrsago Glenn Grant’s Burning Days: old school cyberpunk stories from the nostalgic contrafuture https://memex.craphound.com/2011/03/17/glenn-grants-burning-days-old-school-cyberpunk-stories-from-the-nostalgic-contrafuture/

    #15yrsago World’s largest spam botnet goes down (for now?) https://krebsonsecurity.com/2011/03/rustock-botnet-flatlined-spam-volumes-plummet/

    #15yrsago Piracy doesn’t fund the mob or terrorists https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2011/03/even-commercial-pirates-now-have-to-compete-with-free/

    #15yrsago Tennessee to outlaw collective bargaining for teachers https://web.archive.org/web/20110320023746/https://nashvillecitypaper.com/content/city-news/protesters-arrested-following-disruption-committee-hearing

    #15yrsago Four Color Fear: delightful horror comics from the pre-Code era https://memex.craphound.com/2011/03/16/four-color-fear-delightful-horror-comics-from-the-pre-code-era/

    #10yrsago Screw optimism, we need hope instead https://web.archive.org/web/20160318215827/https://littleatoms.com/society/cory-doctorows-manifesto-hope

    #10yrsago Four sets of identical twins pull an epic NYC subway car time-machine prank https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1Gq7Q3B9xU

    #10yrsago Hack-attacks with stolen certs tell you the future of FBI vs Apple https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/03/to-bypass-code-signing-checks-malware-gang-steals-lots-of-certificates/

    #10yrsago Captured: a book of prison inmate drawings of CEOs and other too-big-to-jail criminals https://thecapturedproject.com/

    #10yrsago From dingo babysitter to net neutrality hero: Tom Wheeler’s legacy https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/03/how-a-former-lobbyist-became-the-broadband-industrys-worst-nightmare/

    #10yrsago Poet/bureaucrat’s moving report of the 1921 demise of America’s most notorious wolf https://web.archive.org/web/20160327105045/https://www.fws.gov/news/Historic/NewsReleases/1921/19210103.pdf

    #10yrsago Barnes & Noble wipes out Nook ebook, replaces it with off-brand “study guide” https://web.archive.org/web/20160316120232/https://www.teleread.com/barnes-noble-stole-first-e-book-ever-bought/

    #10yrsago Scarfolk’s lost 1970s budget announcement lays bare the modern Tory strategy https://scarfolk.blogspot.com/2016/03/scarfolks-annual-budget-announcement.html

    #10yrsago Junkbots from Madrid, recycled from iconic Spanish packaging https://web.archive.org/web/20160321103729/http://www.pitarquerobots.es/

    #10yrsago First-ever Tor node in a Canadian library https://web.archive.org/web/20160319035440/https://motherboard.vice.com/read/canadian-librarians-must-be-ready-to-fight-the-feds-on-running-a-tor-node-western-library-freedom-project

    #10yrsago How to do impromptu magic tricks without being a dork https://www.thejerx.com/blog/2016/3/14/project-slay-them

    #10yrsago Sheriff says rape kits are irrelevant because most rape accusations are false https://www.oregonlive.com/pacific-northwest-news/2016/03/rape_kit_system_unnecessary_si.html

    #10yrsago Redaction fail: U.S. government admits it went after Lavabit looking for Snowden https://www.wired.com/2016/03/government-error-just-revealed-snowden-target-lavabit-case/

    #10yrsago McAfee shovelware emits tracking beacons https://web.archive.org/web/20160909030152/https://duo.com/blog/bring-your-own-dilemma-oem-laptops-and-windows-10-security

    #10yrsago Cops in small MA town warn about roving rap-battle challengers https://www.kron4.com/news/cops-warn-residents-of-men-challenging-others-to-rap-battles/

    #10yrsago Rather than banning “lobbying” by academics, UK government should encourage it https://web.archive.org/web/20160310100844/https://www.timeshighereducation.com/comment/ban-academics-talking-to-ministers-we-should-train-them-to-do-it

    #10yrsago Russia’s military uses gigantic wooden comedy props for punishment https://semperannoying.tumblr.com/post/122390977886/semperannoying-russian-army-punishments-1

    #10yrsago Study: people who believe in innate intelligence overestimate their own https://arstechnica.com/science/2016/03/think-intelligence-is-fixed-youre-more-likely-to-overestimate-your-own/

    #5yrsago SNAPDRAGON https://pluralistic.net/2021/03/17/there-once-was-a-union-maid/#coming-out

    #5yrsago How unions de-risk work https://pluralistic.net/2021/03/17/there-once-was-a-union-maid/#solidarity-forever

    #5yrsago Meet the new music boss, same as the old music boss https://pluralistic.net/2021/03/16/wage-theft/#excessive-buyer-power

    #5yrsago The People’s Parity Project https://pluralistic.net/2021/03/16/wage-theft/#ppp

    #5yrsago SMS security is flaming garbage https://pluralistic.net/2021/03/16/wage-theft/#override-service-registry

    #1yrago David Enrich’s “Murder the Truth” https://pluralistic.net/2025/03/17/actual-malice/#happy-slapping

    Upcoming appearances (permalink)

    A photo of me onstage, giving a speech, pounding the podium.


    A screenshot of me at my desk, doing a livecast.

    Recent appearances (permalink)


    A grid of my books with Will Stahle covers..

    Latest books (permalink)


    A cardboard book box with the Macmillan logo.

    Upcoming books (permalink)

    • “The Reverse-Centaur’s Guide to AI,” a short book about being a better AI critic, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, June 2026 (https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374621568/thereversecentaursguidetolifeafterai/)

    • “Enshittification, Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It” (the graphic novel), Firstsecond, 2026

    • “The Post-American Internet,” a geopolitical sequel of sorts to Enshittification, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2027

    • “Unauthorized Bread”: a middle-grades graphic novel adapted from my novella about refugees, toasters and DRM, FirstSecond, 2027

    • “The Memex Method,” Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2027


    Colophon (permalink)

    Today’s top sources:

    Currently writing: “The Post-American Internet,” a sequel to “Enshittification,” about the better world the rest of us get to have now that Trump has torched America (1002 words today, 52553 total)

    • “The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to AI,” a short book for Farrar, Straus and Giroux about being an effective AI critic. LEGAL REVIEW AND COPYEDIT COMPLETE.

    • “The Post-American Internet,” a short book about internet policy in the age of Trumpism. PLANNING.

    • A Little Brother short story about DIY insulin PLANNING

    This work – excluding any serialized fiction – is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. That means you can use it any way you like, including commercially, provided that you attribute it to me, Cory Doctorow, and include a link to pluralistic.net.

    https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

    Quotations and images are not included in this license; they are included either under a limitation or exception to copyright, or on the basis of a separate license. Please exercise caution.

    How to get Pluralistic:

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    “When life gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla” -Joey “Accordion Guy” DeVilla

    READ CAREFULLY: By reading this, you agree, on behalf of your employer, to release me from all obligations and waivers arising from any and all NON-NEGOTIATED agreements, licenses, terms-of-service, shrinkwrap, clickwrap, browsewrap, confidentiality, non-disclosure, non-compete and acceptable use policies (“BOGUS AGREEMENTS”) that I have entered into with your employer, its partners, licensors, agents and assigns, in perpetuity, without prejudice to my ongoing rights and privileges. You further represent that you have the authority to release me from any BOGUS AGREEMENTS on behalf of your employer.

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  • World News in Brief: Rafah crossing reopens, gender inequality worsens global water crisis, rights defenders in Colombia

    The Rafah crossing into Gaza reopened on Thursday for limited movement in both directions after a 20-day suspension, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

  • The Political Economy of Settler Backlash

    In 2020, the U.S. Supreme Court recognized the enduring existence of the Muscogee (Creek) reservation and, derivatively, tribal criminal jurisdiction over a vast portion of eastern Oklahoma, including Tulsa. The case, McGirt v. Oklahoma, prompted immediate backlash from state officials, who claimed that the decision would cause millions to face uncertain economic realities and undermine extractive…

    Source

  • How Wildlife Traffickers Are Using Coded Language to Sell Protected Animals On Facebook

    How Wildlife Traffickers Are Using Coded Language to Sell Protected Animals On Facebook

    A Bellingcat investigation has identified nine Facebook groups with a combined membership of more than 70,000 people, in which coded language has helped illegal wildlife dealers evade bans on the platform for years. Facebook says it prohibits any form of animal trading on its platform.

    Investigating the operators behind all nine groups, Bellingcat identified six Facebook profiles that led back to a single broker in Jakarta, Indonesia. This investigation was carried out in partnership with Mongabay. You can read their report here.

    In an open Facebook group, brazenly titled “West Bogor Animal Selling and Trading Forum,” one member posts an advert for a vulnerable rhinoceros hornbill.

    Screenshots of an online advertisement for a rhinoceros hornbill chick, a protected and vulnerable species, posted on Facebook on July 11, 2025.

    Commenting on the advert, another member warns: “Just be careful not to get caught.” 

    Screenshot of a Facebook conversation, translated from Bahasa Indonesia and posted in July 2025. Annotated by Bellingcat.

    “That’s the risk,” replies the seller. 

    Under Indonesian law, the capture, trade, or possession of a rhinoceros hornbill is punishable by up to five years’ imprisonment or a fine of up to Rp100 million (US$6,000). (According to Statistics Indonesia, the average monthly wage in August 2025 was just over Rp3 million or US$180.)

    Meta also states that the buying and selling of animals on its platforms is prohibited. However, in this group, along with eight others identified by Bellingcat, animals have been traded in plain sight for years, including wild and protected species. Three of the nine groups have been live on Facebook for at least five years. Four have been active for 12 months or more, and the remaining two were created in 2025.

    Screenshots of tortoises, monkeys, and owls for sale, posted in Facebook adverts in October 2025.

    All nine groups state in their “About” tab that they are based in or around Jakarta, the Indonesian capital. As one of the most biodiverse countries in the world, Indonesia is a hotspot for poachers and a key transit hub in the illegal wildlife trade.

    A quick scan of these groups revealed a variety of protected species for sale, including Javan coucals, Javan scops owls, Javan langurs, binturongs, and both wreathed and rhinoceros hornbills.

    In one of the most active groups, West Bogor Animal Selling and Trading Forum, more than 200 adverts were posted in a single week. Of these, 18 advertised vulnerable species, including these two infant silvery gibbons. 

    Screenshots of two infant silvery gibbons advertised on Facebook on May 10, 2025.

    With fewer than 2,500 mature individuals left in the wild, the silvery gibbon is considered endangered. Under Indonesian law, trading in this species can result in up to five years’ imprisonment or a fine of up to Rp 100 million (US$6,000).

    Otters were also frequently posted in the group. Popular in the Southeast Asian pet trade, most otter species are protected due to declining numbers in the wild. However, because many of the adverts were for infants, it was not always possible to determine which otter species was being sold, and therefore whether it was protected.

    “Using Codes So The Group Stays Safe”

    Despite Facebook’s total ban on animal trading, including pets, in the group titled: Civet/Pet Buying and Selling in the Greater Jakarta Area, members were instructed in the “About” tab to “prioritise using codes so the group stays safe from being banned.”

    Screenshot of the group’s About description. Translated and annotated by Bellingcat.

    Alphanumeric codes were used to discuss animal prices in eight of the nine groups identified by Bellingcat. According to the Indonesian news outlet Jateng Today, the use of pricing codes, intended to circumvent Facebook’s automated moderation systems, is not uncommon among animal traders on the platform.

    Such codes use the letters A, B, and C to denote different Indonesian rupiah denominations. A stands for a Rp100,000 note (about US$6), while B represents a Rp50,000 note (about US$3). An accompanying number specifies the quantity, so A3 indicates three Rp100,000 notes.

    Screenshot of a conversation on Facebook discussing the price of animals. Blurring by Bellingcat.

    In the post below, one member asks, “A2 dapet apa?” – “What does A2 (Rp 200,000; US$12) get you?”

    Screenshot from the Facebook group ‘Buying and Selling civets/pets in the Greater Jakarta area,’ posted on Facebook, August 6, 2024.

    The post received 69 replies, with members offering everything from otters to owls, civets and geckos.

    The term “Wc” – a common shorthand in animal trading groups for “wild-caught” – was also frequently used across all nine groups. Under Indonesian law, even if a species is not listed as vulnerable or protected, capturing and selling wild animals without a permit is illegal.

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    Asked whether its moderation systems could detect cost codes (as text or embedded in images) or key terms such as WC (when found next to images of animals), Meta responded: 

    “Bad actors constantly evolve their tactics to avoid enforcement, which is why we partner with groups like the World Wildlife Fund and invest in tools and technology to detect and remove violating content.”

    The Operators

    While investigating the operators behind all nine groups, Bellingcat identified six Facebook profiles that led back to one individual broker based in Jakarta. 

    By navigating to the “People” tab in one of the groups, a list of admins and moderators appears, including an account referenced below as AB. Despite AB’s profile being locked, a search with the term “wa.” (WhatsApp’s click-to-chat feature) returned dozens of animal adverts alongside a phone number.

    Screenshot of AB’s Facebook post including a phone number. Posted June 11, 2025.

    Using the phone number to search for AB’s historic posts, six out of the nine groups under investigation were found to have adverts for vulnerable species, including this advert for a binturong. 

    Screenshot of an advert for a “Bintu” short for binturong. Posted by AB, September 2024. 

    Listed as vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), keeping a binturong, let alone trading it commercially, is prohibited under Indonesian law.

    AB has also advertised this “Celepuk Wc”, a wild-caught scops owl, seen below. Although the species itself is not protected, selling a wild-caught owl in Indonesia without a permit (which are tightly regulated) violates Indonesian law.

    Owls for sale, posted by AB. Left: Labelled “Wc” for wild-caught. Right: “BC” for bred in captivity. 

    By following the phone number shared by AB, five more Facebook profiles were uncovered. The six profiles frequently shared similar adverts, often within days of each other, for the same species, sometimes featuring a similar interior background, and always listing the same telephone number.

    Six different accounts posting similar-looking animal adverts, while all using the same contact phone number.

    Late last year, one of the accounts referenced below as W, posted this wreathed hornbill, a protected species in Indonesia. 

    Screenshot of an advert for a wreathed hornbill. Posted by Waa, November 2025. 

    Of the six profiles, only one, named Azie Soka Smithh has ever posted personal data, including a profile picture of a man with a child. 

    An advert for a civet, posted by Azie Soka Smithh and tagging the same phone number as used by the other five accounts.

    Further investigation into Azie Soka Smithh confirmed their presence on other platforms, including Telegram and Instagram. However, their full legal name remained unknown. While searching for visual clues to their location, it became apparent that the vast majority of images had been tightly cropped, revealing little about their whereabouts – except for a handful of images that appeared to have been taken at the same location: a pet shop.

    In the adverts shown below, a poster can be seen on the wall behind the cage displaying the shop name Station Sato Exotic and a phone number. Of all the images seemingly taken in the same shop, none featured species protected under Indonesian law. However, the long-tailed macaque shown below is considered endangered according to IUCN due to declining numbers in the wild. 

    Adverts posted by two different accounts but with the same shop name and phone number visible in the background. The right image features a long-tailed macaque.

    A Google search for the shop’s name and number returned a Google Maps listing for Station Sato Exotic. A man named “beni” had left a five-star rating as well as several dozen photos and videos of the pet shop’s interior, including one that appeared to show a man sitting next to an identical poster as seen in the animal adverts. 

    Screenshot of Beni’s Google review, including (right) a video of a man sitting beside a poster for Station Sato Exotic. Posted July 2021.

    According to beni’s Google account, his full name is Beni Abdul Hamid (translated from Arabic). His bio reads: “We sell various kinds of accessories, cages, animal feed, etc” (translated from Bahasa Indonesia).

    Of the 16 photos and 25 videos posted by Beni, several showed a left hand holding animals up to the camera, with a distinctive mole visible on the wrist. A seemingly identical mole appeared in several of the adverts posted by the six Facebook accounts sharing the same phone number. Notably, the mole and wrist were not seen holding species protected under Indonesian law. However, the long-tailed macaque shown below is considered endangered according to IUCN.

    A distinctive mole appears in multiple animal adverts posted by (left) Beni on Google Listings, (centre) AB on Facebook and (right) another of the six accounts using the shared phone number. The centre and right images feature a long-tailed macaque.

    Upon visiting Station Sato Exotic, our partners at Mongabay confirmed that Google reviewer Beni Abdul Hamid was in fact the owner. His son, Jordan Bastian, who was present on the day, told their reporter he now manages the shop on his father’s behalf.

    Bastian confirmed that it was his wrist and mole in the adverts and that he had taken all of the photos inside the shop. However, he said he was not behind any of the six Facebook accounts and that they were most likely run by a local broker. He explained that his business relies on a network of brokers operating on Facebook and WhatsApp. He sends them photos of the animals he has for sale, and they handle sourcing and organising everything with the buyer in exchange for a cut of the profits.

    “I’m a broker. I’m involved in marketing the animals, so I provide the photos,” said Bastian. “I don’t want to know about the buyer.”

    When shown the Facebook account for Azie Soka Smithh, Bastian confirmed that the man in the profile picture was a local broker, but one who seldom visited the shop.

    Station Sato Exotic Pet Shop also has an online presence on Tokopedia, a major Indonesian marketplace. The platform’s guidelines prohibit the sale of endangered species, but are not clear regarding the sale of other animals, including pets.

    Of Station Sato Exotic’s 71 current listings, the large majority have been miscategorised. Animals are listed as tools, toys, aquarium decorations and books. They are also miscategorised as other species; for example, birds and squirrels have been listed as hamsters or reptiles.

    One advert features a vulnerable cuckoo species, the Sunda Coucal. Endemic to Java and numbering fewer than 10,000, this bird has been listed as vulnerable since 1994.

    Screenshot of Station Sato Exotic’s Tokopedia page promoting the sale of a vulnerable cuckoo species. The page reports that four birds have already been sold. 

    Asked whether he had sold many animals via Tokopedia, Bastian said his account had been blocked after he was banned for selling squirrels. When shown the advert above for the Sunda Coucal, he said he was surprised to learn it was classified as vulnerable. Tokopedia did not respond to requests for comment regarding an advert for a vulnerable species appearing on their platform. 

    On the sale of protected or vulnerable species more broadly, Bastian admitted he had in the past, but has since stopped, describing “the risk is big” and saying he prefers to “play it safe.” 

    After contacting the local authorities for comment, three officers from the West Java Natural Resources Conservation Agency (BBKSDA) made a surprise visit to Station Sato Exotic, due to the shop having previously been reported for selling protected species. Head of Conservation Stephanus Hanny said that upon arrival, “We went inside and checked every animal… We did not find any protected species.” He added that even the sale of non-protected wildlife requires a permit, which the shop does not currently hold. However, since it’s not a criminal offence, Hanny said they could only issue the owners with a warning. 

    Bellingcat also contacted the phone number associated with Azie Soka Smithh. The person replied, confirming they managed all six accounts but denied selling any animals, including protected and vulnerable species. “I’m just a hobbyist. An animal lover,” they said. 

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    Given that the account had been found advertising vulnerable and protected species for sale, the Indonesian Director General of Forestry Law Enforcement, Dwi Januanto Nugroho, said authorities would investigate. Asked how their team of investigators was adapting to the illegal wildlife trade growing online, Nugroho replied:

    “Criminal behaviour continues to reproduce itself in order to survive. In fact, it can evolve faster than the law enforcement system itself. In response …cyber patrols and desk analysis via the operations room will continue to be intensified, while we further optimise support from volunteer networks, working partners, and public participation.”

    After contacting Meta, all six accounts, including Azie Soka Smithh, and all nine groups, totalling 70,000 members, were shut down. Meta confirmed: “We removed the Facebook groups and profiles in question for violating our Restricted Goods and Services Policy.”

    Merel Zoet and Claire Press contributed to this report.

    Bellingcat is a non-profit and the ability to carry out our work depends on the kind support of individual donors. If you would like to support our work, you can do so here. You can also subscribe to our Patreon channel here. Subscribe to our Newsletter and follow us on Bluesky here and Mastodon here.

    The post How Wildlife Traffickers Are Using Coded Language to Sell Protected Animals On Facebook appeared first on bellingcat.

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