“New Low”: Terrorist Organisations in Pakistan Recruit Operatives in J&K Through Porn Websites

Porn websites are a new hiding place for terror networks located in Pakistan.

According to security agencies, terrorists and their handlers in Pakistan are now using real-time chat features on dating and pornographic platforms to recruit and communicate with operatives in Jammu and Kashmir after abandoning well-known encrypted platforms like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and Signal.

According to officials, the action is a planned ruse to evade Indian security agency surveillance. “By using platforms that are banned in India and accessed illegally through VPNs, terror handlers are masking their digital footprints and evading surveillance on mainstream social media,” a senior security force officer said.

Intelligence reports indicate that the strategy is both clever and blatant. Terrorists are communicating with overground workers and passing orders through secret chat rooms on sexual websites.

Applications based on Tor, including Coatex and Conion, are widely used to hide identities and make tracking more challenging. Other ultra-private apps provide self-destructing communications, end-to-end encryption, and registration without a SIM card or mobile number, leaving almost no digital trace.

The fact that some of these specialised apps run even on sluggish 2G and EDGE networks, making them useful in rural locations with spotty connectivity, makes them more riskier.

Following several crackdowns by Indian agencies on traditional terror communication channels, officials indicated that Pakistan’s intelligence agency, ISI, is aggressively fostering this shadow ecosystem to maintain its proxy war in Jammu and Kashmir. In order to uncover these secret digital modules, intelligence services have increased their surveillance of VPN usage and implemented technical countermeasures.