logo
Tren de Aragua gang kingpin makes FBI's Ten Most Wanted list

Tren de Aragua gang kingpin makes FBI's Ten Most Wanted list

New York Post4 days ago

A Tren de Aragua kingpin landed on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list — marking the first time a member of the prison gang has made the bureau's famous rogues' gallery.
Giovanni Vicente Mosquera Serrano, 37, is wanted for organizing drug trafficking and terrorism operations for the notorious Venezuelan outfit that operates throughout the US and other countries.
The FBI highlighted Serrano's addition to the list on Tuesday and announced a $3 million bounty for information leading to the capture of the Venezuelan gangbanger.
'Tren de Aragua is allegedly responsible for sending gang members to the U.S. who engage in drug trafficking, human trafficking, weapons trafficking, and violent crime,' the FBI said in a statement.
The gang rose to infamy last year for taking over whole apartment buildings in Colorado, a sanctuary state.
3 Photo of Giovanni Vicente Mosquera Serrano, an alleged senior leader of the Tren de Aragua transnational gang.
FBI
3 FBI wanted poster for Giovanni Vicente Mosquera Serrano, alleged senior leader of the Tren de Aragua gang.
FBI
President Trump later branded Tren de Aragua a terrorist organization and made it a prime target in his sweeping immigration crackdown.
Serrano faces charges of conspiracy to provide and providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization, as well as conspiracy and distribution of cocaine in Colombia intended for distribution in the US.
The Department of the Treasury also sanctioned Serrano on Tuesday, freezing his assets in the US.
3 Photo of Giovanni Vicente Mosquera Serrano, alleged senior leader of the Tren de Aragua gang.
FBI
'[Tren de Aragua] remains focused on terrorizing our communities and facilitating the flow of illicit narcotics into our country, relying on key leaders like Mosquera Serrano to finance and oversee their violent operations,' said Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent.
Trump has designated Tren de Aragua as an invading force under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act, which he has used to deport Venezuelan migrants to a notorious superprison in El Salvador.
In April, the Justice Department leveled the first terrorism charge against a Tren de Aragua member, Jose Enrique Martinez Flores, an alleged part of the organization's 'inner circle.'

Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Blast ‘em: Get rid of the blocky brutalist buildings that blight our nation's capital
Blast ‘em: Get rid of the blocky brutalist buildings that blight our nation's capital

New York Post

time5 hours ago

  • New York Post

Blast ‘em: Get rid of the blocky brutalist buildings that blight our nation's capital

There's a reason God created dynamite. The brutalist federal buildings that have blighted Washington, DC for decades deserve the same fate as Carthage after the Third Punic War, and the nation's capital is finally beginning to move on from these concrete monstrosities. The Department of Housing and Urban and Development just announced that it is leaving its godawful headquarters in Washington for less hideous space in northern Virginia. Advertisement HUD Secretary Scott Turner has described the structure as 'the ugliest building in DC,' which is a dubious claim only because there are so many other buildings in Washington that compete for that distinction. He's not the first HUD secretary to hate the building. Jack Kemp called it '10 floors of basement.' Meanwhile, the FBI is also departing its HQ, designated by the UK building materials retailer Buildworld as the ugliest building in the United States and the second ugliest in the world. Advertisement The moves are in keeping with the spirit of President Donald Trump's executive order stipulating that federal buildings should 'respect regional, traditional, and classical architectural heritage in order to uplift and beautify public spaces and ennoble the United States and our system of self-government.' That EO should be considered common sense, but has several trigger words for defenders of the architectural status quo, including 'traditional,' 'classical,' and perhaps foremost of all, 'beautify.' In response, the American Institute of Architects expressed its 'strong concerns that mandating architecture styles stifles innovation and harms local communities.' According to The Nation magazine, Trump's initiative is part of an agenda to 'to make historical architecture on the whole inextricable from Eurocentric white supremacy.' Advertisement In short, it's an unforgivable offense to want a government building to look nice. Brutalism, with its blocky, minimalist structures made of poured concrete, was a creation of a post-war Europe that wanted to embrace the fresh and new and to economize on rebuilding. Although the name 'brutalism' perfectly captures the aesthetic effect, it actually comes from the French for raw concrete, béton brut. To be sure, concrete is extremely important to modern life, but no one has ever said, 'Oh, it's so elegant and uplifting.' Advertisement The brutalist buildings in Washington were largely built between the late 1960s and mid-1970s — an era of grievous architectural mistakes, including cookie-cutter multiple-purpose baseball stadiums and modernist Catholic churches. Get opinions and commentary from our columnists Subscribe to our daily Post Opinion newsletter! Thanks for signing up! Enter your email address Please provide a valid email address. By clicking above you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Never miss a story. Check out more newsletters The buildings never had a heyday, but were hated when they were erected and are still hated now. The seedbed of the trend was a Kennedy administration commission that advocated contemporary designs and said — laughably, in retrospect — that federal architecture should 'reflect the dignity, enterprise, vigor and stability of the American national government.' Instead, the brutalist buildings speak of a lumbering bureaucracy with no regard for the sensibilities or priorities of ordinary people. They are about what you'd expect if a DMV were headquartered in a maximum-security prison, or in a massive pillbox. These buildings could easily be used as stage sets for docudramas about East Germany. They are a tribute to soulless monumentality and a gut punch to the human spirit. Advertisement If they don't eventually get a well-deserved appointment with a wrecking ball, they should be donated to North Korea. The original justifications of brutalism no longer apply. The buildings aren't new anymore, and they aren't cheap. They haven't aged well in any sense, not aesthetically or functionally. The FBI building is literally falling apart, and the expense of maintaining the HUD building has become ruinous. Advertisement Defenders of the brutalist buildings say that they are now part of our heritage and should be preserved as such. That's not fair, though, to the people who have to work in them, or who walk or drive by them every day. They are a net subtraction to the DC landscape and to human happiness. If one of them has to be kept for historical reasons, it should be made into a Smithsonian museum devoted to idiotic fads that were indulged much too long. Twitter: @RichLowry

FBI Warning Issued As 2FA Bypass Attacks Surge — Get Prepared
FBI Warning Issued As 2FA Bypass Attacks Surge — Get Prepared

Forbes

time5 hours ago

  • Forbes

FBI Warning Issued As 2FA Bypass Attacks Surge — Get Prepared

The FBI issues Scattered Spider attack warning. Update, June 29, 2025: This story, originally published on June 28, has been updated with expert comment from cybersecurity professionals regarding the Scattered Spider threat group referenced in the latest FBI 2fa-bypass attack warning. When the Federal Bureau of Investigation issues a cybersecurity alert, you would be well advised to pay attention and take action. Whether that's involving malicious SMS messages, AI-powered phishing attacks, or, as I recently reported, the skyrocketing number of ransomware threats. And ransomware is the subject of this latest, critical, warning from the FBI. This time involving the Scattered Spider threat group which has made headlines after taking responsibility for multiple retail sector attacks including that against Marks & Spencer in the U.K. which is estimated to have cost the high street chain at least $600 million. Now the group is targeting the airline industry, the FBI has warned, both directly and through the entire supply chain. Here's what you need to know. FBI Confirms Scattered Spider Attacks Targeting Transportation A June 26 report from ransomware analysts at Halcyon warned that there were 'indications that Scattered Spider is also now targeting the Food, Manufacturing, and Transportation (particularly Aviation) sectors in the US.' This has now been confirmed by the FBI which provided a statement to me by email that said: 'The FBI has recently observed the cybercriminal group Scattered Spider expanding its targeting to include the airline sector.' The statement, also posted to X, fomrerly known as Twitter, continued to confirm that the ransomware group is using the same methods during this surge of attacks into new sectors, namely 'social engineering techniques, often impersonating employees or contractors to deceive IT help desks into granting access.' Specifically, Scattered Spider looks to bypass mutli-factor authentication, commonly referred to as MFA or 2FA, by using various methods to get those help desks to 'add unauthorized MFA devices to compromised accounts.' Scattered Spider has been on the FBI radar for a number of years, with a joint cybersecurity advisory alongside the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency published in 2023 in response to what it described as 'activity by Scattered Spider threat actors against the commercial facilities sectors and subsectors.' The FBI told me that it is currently actively working with aviation and industry partners 'to address this activity and assist victims,' and urged anyone who thinks their organization may have been targeted to contact their local FBI office. In the meantime, beware of anyone asking for unauthorized 2FA devices to be added to accounts and follow established security processes and procedures to the letter, no matter what the person making the request may say. FBI Warned Of Aviation Attacks, But Insurance Sector Also Now Being Targeted By Scattered Spider Although the latest FBI warning focused on current attack threats targeting the transportation, and specifically aviation, sector and its supply chain, Scattered Spider has also expanded to include the insurance industry in its crosshairs. "Google Threat Intelligence Group is now aware of multiple intrusions in the US which bear all the hallmarks of Scattered Spider activity,' John Hultquist, the chief analyst with the Google Threat Intelligence Group, has said, 'we are now seeing incidents in the insurance industry.' Jon Abbott, CEO at ThreatAware, prudently advised that while 'the rising tide of attacks on US insurers' is a serious threat that should not be underestimated, it also represents 'a warning for other industries to stay vigilant.' Although the Scattered Spider group has historically leaned towards targeting one industry sector at a time, there is a danger that, as aviation is now in the spotlight, other organizations take their eye off the remaining peril in front of them. With one common denominator between many attacks being the exploitation of the supply chain, with such compromise enabling lateral movement onto bigger fish, this is evidence that businesses that might not consider themselves in the aviation, insurance or retail sectors are still at risk. Richard Orange, a vice president at Abnormal AI, reiterates what the FBI has said. 'This group relies on social engineering rather than technical exploits,' Orange said, 'and bypasses traditional security controls by manipulating people, such as posing as IT staff or trusted partners.' This can often appear like an isolated incident or breach, but Scattered Spider will move laterally, Orange concluded, 'harvesting credentials to deceive other departments, customers, and partners.'

2 arrested at LA home linked to Iranian 'human smuggling hub': CBP
2 arrested at LA home linked to Iranian 'human smuggling hub': CBP

Fox News

time5 hours ago

  • Fox News

2 arrested at LA home linked to Iranian 'human smuggling hub': CBP

Federal officials arrested two people on Friday at a Los Angeles house tied to a suspected Iranian human smuggling network said to have been "repeatedly used to harbor illegal entrants linked to terrorism." Customs and Border Protection (CBP) announced the arrests in an X post on Friday, saying that the operation was part of a broader national security effort involving multiple federal agencies. "CBP executed a federal search warrant today at a human smuggling hub in Los Angeles tied to national security threats," the agency said. "Two individuals were arrested during the operation, which was led by CBP's Special Response Team with support from Border Patrol tactical units and Air and Marine Operations." The detentions follow the arrests of seven Iranian nationals at the same location earlier last week, CBP said, adding that the suspects were on the FBI Terror Watchlist and connected to an Iranian human trafficking hub. "The location has been repeatedly used to harbor illegal entrants linked to terrorism," CBP said. Officials did not identify the two suspects taken into custody at the home on Friday. "Under @POTUS, CBP is taking aggressive action to shut down smuggling networks and remove national security threats before they can do harm," the agency said. CBP did not immediately respond to a request for more information from Fox News Digital.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store