Hello Kitty, the Japanese cartoon figure popular with teenagers around the world, was used by a notorious Colombian drug lord to hide messages to his minions, according to the Folha de Sao Paulo newspaper.
Juan Carlos Ramirez Abadia, who is being held in Brazil after his arrest in August, hid voice and text messages digitally encoded into e-mailed images of the innocent feline, Brazilian police said.
Investigators say the disguised missives, hundreds of which were found on Abadia's computer, could put the narcotics kingpin up to his neck in kitty litter as some of them allegedly detail cocaine shipments between countries.
PHOTO: AFP
The newspaper said the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) broke the binary code containing the messages under the Hello Kitty images because Brazilian police lacked the necessary computer equipment.
It added the same technique of hiding messages in seemingly innocuous image files was used by Al-Qaeda to prepare the Sep. 11, 2001 attacks.
Abadia apparently picked Hello Kitty as his courier because his wife was a big fan of the Japanese icon - she had even decorated one of her rooms in a Brazilian house with Hello Kitty-themed chairs, watches and wallpaper.
Abadia, 44, is currently the subject of extradition proceedings requested by the US, which wants to try him on drug trafficking, money-laundering and murder charges.
The Colombian, who has previously been convicted in his own country for trafficking, is suspected to have headed the ultra-violent Valle del Norte cartel.
He is being kept in a high-security prison pending the verdict by Brazil's supreme court on the US extradition request.(AFP)
據巴西聖保羅頁報報導，風靡全世界青少年的日本卡通人物凱蒂貓，被一個惡名昭彰的哥倫比亞大毒梟用來傳遞秘密訊息給他的下游藥頭。
巴西警方表示，瓊．卡洛斯．拉米雷茲．阿巴迪亞去年八月落網後就被收押在巴西；他把錄音和文字訊息經過數位編碼後，隱藏在天真可愛的凱蒂貓圖片中，再透過電子郵件發送出去。
調查員說，他們在阿巴迪亞的電腦中找到數百封這類偽裝書信，這堆信件一定讓這個大毒梟忙翻了，因為當中部份信件據說藏有跨國運送古柯鹼的細節。
報導指出，因為巴西警方缺乏所需的電腦設備，便借助美國緝毒局之力，破解了凱蒂貓圖片中的二進位制加密訊息。
報導還說，蓋達組織在策劃二００一年的九一一攻擊時，也是利用這種在看似無害的圖片中藏匿秘密訊息的方法。
阿巴迪亞會挑選凱蒂貓作為掩護，顯然是因為他的太太是這個日本偶像的大粉絲；她甚至在他們巴西的房子內，佈置了一間凱蒂貓房，裡面有凱蒂貓座椅、手錶和壁紙。
美國正積極要求引渡四十四歲的阿巴迪亞至美受審，期以毒品買賣、洗錢和謀殺等罪名將他起訴。
曾在祖國哥倫比亞因毒品買賣而被判刑的阿巴迪亞，疑為北河谷卡特爾暴力販毒組織的首腦。
阿巴迪亞目前收押在一所高度戒護的監獄中，等待巴西最高法院針對美方提出的引渡要求做出裁定。
（法新社／翻譯：袁星塵）
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