Stolen military equipment offered on eBay, Craigslist

Stephen Withers
Monday, 14 April 2008 13:39

Business IT - Networking

The examples "clearly show the real risk that illegal weapons brokers, terrorists, and unauthorized agents of foreign governments also number among potential buyers."

Some of the incidents have been referred for criminal investigation.

According to the report, the sensitive items could be used directly against US interests (Iraqi insurgents have been known to wear US uniforms) or be subjected to reverse engineering in order to create countermeasures or equivalent items.

Previous GAO investigations have found that potentially sensitive items have been inappropriately offered for sale through the US Government's own liquidation web site, and that the Department of Defense has sold new and unused items through that site at a fraction of their value at the same time as purchasing additional units of the same items from their suppliers.