ISI used same set of social media IDs to trap sailors, finds NIA investigation

NEW DELHI: The National Investigation Agency (NIA)’s initial probe into the naval spy ring busted in December has found that Pakistan’s spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), used the same set of social media accounts to honey trap sailors and paid them very small amounts of money, officials familiar with the matter said.

As of now, the agency has found that no sensitive information could have been leaked to the ISI since the navy personnel did not have access to any classified information, the officials added. But the further inquiry is on to ascertain if any specifics of naval vessels or submarines of Vishakhapatnam’s Eastern Naval Command or Western command in Mumbai were shared with the ISI. Most of the personnel under probe had joined the navy after 2015. Other suspicious cases are also being checked, the officials said.

As many as 10 sailors have been arrested since the espionage racket was busted on December 20 in a joint operation of the Andhra Pradesh police and central intelligence agencies.

The NIA suspects there could be more navy personnel in the lower ranks, who were honeytrapped.

“It appears that a particular set of women working as Pakistani agents, most likely based in a third country, were using these Facebook and other social media accounts to get in touch with the navy personnel. Once they befriended the personnel, they were either blackmailed or some willingly started bragging about their work, job profile,” said one of the officials cited above.

The agency is in the process of sending Letters Rogatory or judicial request for seeking information from foreign jurisdictions to the United States for information on the Facebook accounts used to honey-trap the personnel.

The official said the money paid to the sailors was not very big. “Small amounts like ~ 5,000 to ~10,000 were paid to the navy personnel through a hawala dealer.

We are further checking everyone’s accounts and personal investments,” he added.

The “handler” of the Pakistani agents, who was trying to penetrate the Indian naval installation through its personnel, is yet to be identified.

It is suspected that both eastern and western naval command centre responsible for the security of the maritime borders with Pakistan were exposed to the Pakistani agents.

After the spy ring was busted, the navy had asked all its personnel on-board warships, dockyards and naval bases to keep themselves away from social media and smartphones.

Earlier, in a similar espionage case probed by the NIA, the agency in April 2018 put Pakistani diplomat Amir Zubair Siddiqui

posted as visa counsellor in the Pakistani High Commission in Colombo on its wanted list along with two other senior Pakistani officers for conspiring to launch 26/11-type attacks on US and Israeli consulates besides army and navy commands in south India in 2014.

Siddiqui was even charged by the NIA in February 2018 for planning attacks on vital installations in Chennai and other places in south India with the help of his agents.

Siddiqui allegedly hired Sri Lankan national Muhammed Sakir Hussaien and others, including Arun Selvaraj, Sivabalan and Thameem Ansari, all of whom were arrested by Indian agencies.

It was alleged that after recruiting them, Siddiqui instructed them to collect information about defence installations, nuclear establishments and movement of arms and click photographs of such places, the NIA said in its charge sheet. The Pakistanis had also asked them to steal laptops of senior Indian army officers and supply fake Indian currency notes, the agency had added.

AS OF NOW, NIA FEELS THAT NO SENSITIVE INFO COULD HAVE REACHED ISI SINCE THE ARRESTED NAVY PERSONNEL DIDN’T HAVE ACCESS TO ANY CLASSIFIED INFO