PJ Vogt

This was unprecedented.

In the past, the FBI had used informants, but the idea that the FBI would run, from the beginning, a company for criminals?

This was audacious.

And they hadn't just started a company.

They'd done it and then managed to successfully compete with the other real criminal phone companies, companies like EncroChat or Sky, that were actually being run for the benefit of criminals.

So tell me the story from the FBI's perspective.

Like, how did the FBI come to be running, you know, the criminal iPhone company?

Phantom Secure.

Remember, this was the same company that we'd heard the Australian news report about, the precursor to Anon.

They'd sold tens of thousands of encrypted phones before being taken down by American law enforcement.

The main reason being that the founder of Phantom Secure, Vincent Ramos, had initially promised to cooperate with the FBI, to actually let them hack into his unhackable network and trace the criminals using it.

But at the last minute, he changed his mind and tried to flee instead.

He was too scared of reprisals from former customers.

which for a moment had left the FBI at a dead end.

Until they noticed another character in the mix.

Afgu.

Remember Afgu?

Before Anam, he'd actually worked with Phantom Secure, and he'd had plans to start his own criminal phone network.

But now that Afgu saw the feds had arrested the head of Phantom Secure, he got scared.

Were they going to roll him up, too?