https://www.npr.org/2020/11/17/916890880/we-are-shipping-to-the-u-s-china-s-fentanyl-sellers-find-new-routes-to-drug-user

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Inside China's Online Fentanyl Chemical Networks Helping Fuel The
Opioid Crisis China banned fentanyl last year, but an NPR
investigation reveals how Chinese vendors continue to market the
chemicals used to make the drug on e-commerce and social media sites.

World

'We Are Shipping To The U.S.': Inside China's Online Synthetic Drug
Networks

November 17, 20205:03 AM ET
Heard on Morning Edition
Emily Feng at NPR headquarters in Washington, D.C., March 19, 2019.
(photo by Allison Shelley)

Emily Feng

'We Are Shipping To The U.S.': Inside China's Online Synthetic Drug
Networks

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  * Transcript

In May 2019, China's government banned the production and sale of
fentanyl and its many variants. But more than a year later, Chinese
vendors continue to market the precursors used to make fentanyl
online and ship them directly to customers in the United States,
Europe and Mexico.
Enlarge this image
Kim Ryu for NPR
Kim Ryu for NPR

He is a slight, bespectacled man. Colleagues at the industrial
materials company where he works describe him as a humorous but
diligent employee, known for driving his white Jeep around town in
northwestern China's Ningxia region to meet potential clients.

Unbeknownst to them, he goes by Benjamin Chen online, where he has a
whole other business: He is a popular seller of the chemicals used to
make the potent synthetic opioid fentanyl. NPR has identified him but
is not using his real name because of the illegal activity in which
he's involved.

Chen is one of more than 100 vendors who market fentanyl or related
chemicals out of facilities across China, and his story illustrates
how networks are getting around international efforts to crack down
on the supply chain of lethal synthetic opioids. In an interview with
NPR, however, Chen categorically denied that he manufactures or sells
any illegal substances.

For years, China has been a primary source of fentanyl trafficked
into the United States. It is a powerful prescription drug for severe
pain that's made and sold illegally. It led to more than 37,000
overdose deaths in the U.S. in 2019, part of a national opioid crisis
that has worsened this year during the coronavirus pandemic,
according to federal health authorities.

Street Fentanyl Surges In Western U.S., Leading To Thousands Of
Deaths

National

Street Fentanyl Surges In Western U.S., Leading To Thousands Of
Deaths

Under international pressure, China's government banned the
production and sale of fentanyl and many of its variants in May 2019,
resulting in a significant reduction in the country's illicit
fentanyl trade.

But more than a year later, Chinese vendors have tapped into online
networks to brazenly market fentanyl analogs and the precursor
chemicals used to make fentanyl, and ship them directly to customers
in the U.S. and Europe as well as to Mexican cartels, according to an
NPR investigation and research from the Center for Advanced Defense
Studies, or C4ADS, a nonprofit data analysis group. (The center
receives some of its funds from the U.S. and U.K. governments.)

Some of the substances are outlawed in China and internationally.
Others are so new they are not yet banned, are harder to detect and
regulate, and they can be used in basic chemical processes to produce
illegal drugs.

Chinese vendors are often camouflaged by a complex network of
corporate entities registered in far-flung cities along China's
interior, where they use sophisticated shipping methods to bypass
screening measures and where law enforcement scrutiny is often laxer
than in bigger cities such as Beijing or Shanghai. Thousands of doses
can be shipped together in small, hidden packages.

"Many Chinese networks involved in the production and advertising of
fentanyl quickly adapted to increased legal constraints by modifying
their techniques to exploit loopholes in chemical restrictions and
disguise their activities," said Michael Lohmuller, a C4ADS analyst
and report co-author.

Hard to ban

When China began banning fentanyl-related compounds, it was hailed as
a major victory for U.S. narcotics authorities and diplomats, who had
lobbied China for years to strictly regulate the substances more
broadly as a class. Previously, Chinese narcotics authorities
criminalized only specific fentanyl offshoots.

[img_2062_s]
Enlarge this image

Sacks of coal byproducts await sale at a manufacturing site in
northwestern China's Ningxia region, where Benjamin Chen works as a
salesperson. Emily Feng/NPR hide caption

toggle caption
Emily Feng/NPR

Sacks of coal byproducts await sale at a manufacturing site in
northwestern China's Ningxia region, where Benjamin Chen works as a
salesperson.

Emily Feng/NPR

Months after China's class ban last year, as tensions escalated
between the Trump administration and the government under China's
leader Xi Jinping, Chinese-made fentanyl compounds once again became
a divisive topic.

"President Xi said this would stop -- it didn't," President Trump
tweeted in August 2019.

China's government refutes this, saying its ban and crackdown on
Internet advertising, sales and shipments have been effective.

"Currently, there is basically no information related to the illegal
sales of fentanyl-class chemicals on websites within Chinese borders
or pharmaceutical and chemical platforms," China's National Narcotics
Control Commission said in a statement to NPR. "But due to the
openness, anonymity, convenience, cross-border nature of the
Internet, any country would have a difficult time completely
eradicating illegal information."

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration notes that the detected
amount of Chinese fentanyl shipments has dropped dramatically since
the ban.

"It was all coming through the mail, aircraft, not in large
quantities because it was so pure the fentanyl that they were making
over in China ... but once they classified entire analogs of
fentanyl, it made a huge difference," said Matt Donahue, the DEA
deputy chief of operations who oversees the agency's work abroad.

Vendors create new distribution strategy

Despite the drop in fentanyl shipments from China, nimble Chinese
vendors have developed new distribution strategies by producing and
selling the precursor chemicals used to make fentanyl.

Benjamin Chen is among the many vendors in the country who adopted
these new strategies. He and his colleagues built up a robust online
synthetic drug operation over the last decade at Shanghai Huilitongda
Biological Technology Co. Ltd., which is registered as a
pharmaceutical company, according to Chinese corporate records.

On Facebook, where he did much of his advertising, Chen had a
reputation as a fast and reliable vendor, according to social media
reviews left by nearly a dozen customers. "Benjamin Chen is the real
deal," someone identified as a customer wrote in a Facebook post in
December 2018. "If he can't do it, nobody can."

Potential clients could inspect grainy snapshots of nondescript
powders and pills on Facebook. Occasionally, Chen replied directly to
loyal customers, even paying for a Lyft ride to the hospital as
compensation when one customer complained he had overdosed on Chen's
product.

Sometimes operating under the pseudonym "King Sun" or "Sun King," he
also advertised his chemical wares openly on LinkedIn, Twitter and
Vimeo before and after the class ban last year.

Chen adapted to the ban by selling fentanyl precursors, or what he
called "hot products for research chemicals" -- compounds that are
only a few chemical steps away from a fentanyl analog and that are
not always criminalized. Other substances on sale included a
sometimes deadly synthetic opioid also known as "pink," and synthetic
cannabinoids.

Chen adapted to the ban by selling fentanyl precursors, or what he
called "hot products for research chemicals" -- compounds that are
only a few chemical steps away from a fentanyl analog and are not
always criminalized.
Enlarge this image
Kim Ryu for NPR
Kim Ryu for NPR

C4ADS found at least 31 vendors on Alibaba, the Chinese wholesale
e-commerce platform, selling four fentanyl precursors under shortened
chemical serial numbers in September 2019, more than three months
after the fentanyl class ban went into effect. Alibaba has since
taken down nearly all listings for those four precursors.

Since April, however, C4ADS has identified 32 vendors on Alibaba 
advertising two other precursors that can be used to make fentanyl
but are not banned in either the U.S. or China.

In a statement to NPR, Alibaba said that it "prohibits the listing by
third-party sellers of any controlled substances" and that the
company cooperates with law enforcement when needed.

While stricter regulation has not wiped out the fentanyl-related
industry in China, it has made it more difficult for illicit vendors
to operate.

A salesperson for Hebei Aicrowe Biotech Co. Ltd., a pharmaceuticals
maker registered in Shijiazhuang, the capital of Hebei province, said
the company had drastically reduced the number of synthetic opioids
and other compounds it offered because of the heightened legal
scrutiny in China.

But when NPR visited the company in November 2019, the salesperson
confirmed it still sold "99918," which is code for a popular fentanyl
precursor, according to C4ADS analysts, and was banned in China in
2018.

"The customer has the responsibility to guarantee the compound is
legal where the receiving address is," the salesperson said.

Most of the chemicals salespeople NPR spoke to for this story did not
give their names. Their work could lead to harsh punishment in China,
where drug trafficking is punishable by death.

Easy to make, easy to hide

Fentanyl production and exports continue apace in obscure Chinese
cities. One laboratory in Hebei province was tucked inside a
sprawling industrial warehouse complex.

Loading...

Inside, narcotics investigators found a prolific fentanyl production
operation -- all contained within two small rooms with "product drying
on tape in sheet cake pans," said a U.S. Immigration and Customs
Enforcement official posted in China. The official spoke on condition
of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly to a
reporter about his work on the case.

In November 2018, Chinese police -- acting on a tip from the U.S. --
seized more than 26 pounds of fentanyl and 42 pounds of other drugs
from the lab and eventually sentenced nine people from the city of
Xingtai in Hebei a year later in a major Chinese-U.S. joint drug
takedown. The Xingtai government declined to be interviewed.

[ap_1931137]
Enlarge this image

Fentanyl drug traffickers are sentenced in court last year in Xingtai
in northeast China's Hebei province. The court sentenced at least
nine fentanyl traffickers in a case that was the culmination of a
rare collaboration between Chinese and U.S. law enforcement to crack
down on global networks that manufacture and distribute lethal
synthetic opioids. Jin Liangkuai/Xinhua via AP hide caption

toggle caption
Jin Liangkuai/Xinhua via AP

Fentanyl drug traffickers are sentenced in court last year in Xingtai
in northeast China's Hebei province. The court sentenced at least
nine fentanyl traffickers in a case that was the culmination of a
rare collaboration between Chinese and U.S. law enforcement to crack
down on global networks that manufacture and distribute lethal
synthetic opioids.

Jin Liangkuai/Xinhua via AP

The successful bust won international praise but also drew attention
to how easily synthetic opioids can be manufactured in small,
clandestine spaces with rudimentary equipment.

"With globalization and supply chain management run by Web-savvy
criminals, you don't have to have this big, scary criminal network,"
said the ICE official, who participated in the joint investigation.
"You just have to be able to run a business and take advantage of
modern technology."

Synthetic opioid vendors favor working out of China's industrial
hinterlands, where policing can be less strict. Of the 92 fentanyl
and fentanyl-analog selling entities C4ADS was able to identify with
location details, 41% listed their corporate address in Shijiazhuang.
The provincial capital, in northeastern China, is known for its
once-thriving coal, steel and other heavy industries.

China has a vast pharmaceuticals and bulk chemical manufacturing
sector, making compounds sold globally intended for legitimate
purposes in medicine and industrial processes. Synthetic opioid
vendors shield themselves behind layers of interlinked companies
registered in these sectors or related fields such as biotechnology.
The drug vendors NPR visited worked out of offices tucked away in
shopping malls, residential towers and industrial complexes.

"You can do this sort of business from anywhere," said a salesperson
at Crovell Biotech Co. Ltd., a fentanyl-analog vendor in
Shijiazhuang. To keep operations secure, Crovell employees said they
market and export their drugs in-house from Shijiazhuang, but the
riskiest part -- manufacturing the synthetic compounds themselves --
was done by Crovell employees "not near here."

[img_2053_s]
Enlarge this image

A manufacturing site where Chen works as a salesperson. Emily Feng/
NPR hide caption

toggle caption
Emily Feng/NPR

A manufacturing site where Chen works as a salesperson.

Emily Feng/NPR

Chen chose to operate from a base in Ningxia, where he worked at a
company selling materials used in steelmaking.

Corporate records seen by C4ADS and NPR show Chen also registered a
string of export and pharmaceutical companies linked to his
opioid-selling operation in Ningxia.

In September 2019, NPR managed to meet Chen at the industrial
materials company where he works. He wore sneakers and a black zip-up
hoodie. When asked about his online accounts, Chen ushered the
reporter into a private conference room and quickly closed the door.
His eyes darted around nervously, and he cleared his throat
repeatedly

When confronted about his illicit business, Chen told NPR he did not
sell fentanyl or precursors and denied he was the person behind the
moniker "King Sun."

"I have never done anything illegal, and my work is all within legal
bounds," Chen said.

Direct trade

Access to the Internet gives even small-time sellers in China
transnational reach to market and ship their potent products.

Vendors continue to operate openly on platforms, including Facebook,
Twitter, Wickr, MeWe and Vimeo, advertising a head-spinning array of
chemicals tagged with an obscure but internationally used numerical
naming system.

"Sellers and buyers know the obscure acronyms, code names, chemical
registration numbers and the like, and are able to change on a dime
when one trusted member of a group is raided or arrested," said Logan
Pauley, a former C4ADS analyst who worked on the report.

Facebook said in a statement to NPR that its online standards
explicitly say "buying, selling or trading non-medical or
pharmaceutical drugs is not allowed on Facebook. Any time we become
aware of content on Facebook that is facilitating activity like drug
sales, we remove it and have taken numerous measures to minimize the
opportunity for these activities to take place on our platform."
(Facebook is a financial supporter of NPR.)

Synthetic opioid vendors have access to a powerful tool: the
Internet, which gives even small-time sellers in China transnational
reach in marketing and shipping their highly potent products.
Enlarge this image
Kim Ryu for NPR
Kim Ryu for NPR

Twitter said it does not allow its platform to be used to facilitate
illegal transactions and that its advertisement policy prohibits the
promotion of drugs and paraphernalia.

The video platform Vimeo said it "bans users from uploading or
sharing content on Vimeo that violates any applicable law," including
fentanyl and fentanyl-related compounds.

The social media company MeWe said that "any group, page, or member
reported on MeWe that is found to be selling any sort of illegal drug
is swiftly removed by MeWe's Trust and Safety Team and may be
reported to the authorities."

Wickr did not respond to requests for comment.

U.S. law enforcement acknowledged struggling to curb this online
fentanyl marketplace, in part because many of the transactions are
encrypted. "We know it's happening. We still cannot get cooperation
from major Internet companies, service providers, to be able to get
into those devices that we know [drug cartels] are utilizing," the
DEA's Donahue said.

He pointed to the Chinese social media platform WeChat as
particularly problematic. WeChat's parent company, Tencent, did not
respond to NPR's request for comment.

"Traffickers have intelligence just like we do," Donahue said. "The
Chinese have great intelligence. They know we can't get into this
stuff. That's why they utilize those methods of communication to be
able to ship drugs. They know law enforcement doesn't have the means
or the know-how or the resources to infiltrate."

Drugs by mail

In August 2019, more than three months after China's class ban, the
U.S. government issued an advisory warning federal agencies of
continued shipments of fentanyl and other synthetic opioids,
including via the U.S. Postal Service and private express mail
services. The Treasury Department has also used bank data to identify
fentanyl vendors. In 2019, the department sanctioned three Chinese
nationals accused of trafficking the synthetic opioids.

However, vendors still manage to send the packages within aluminum
alloy bags through international mail carriers complete with tracking
numbers, so customers can monitor the itinerary from halfway around
the world.

"Our company [is a legal business] in China. We offer [discreet] and
reliable packaging and delivery. Fast and reliable shipping within 48
hours, using courier service, DHL, EMS, TNT, FedEx, UPS," Gaosheng
Biotechnology Co. Ltd. coached its sales associates to say on more
than 100 social media and advertising sites, according to a company
document seen by NPR. The company has advertised an array of drugs,
including a popular fentanyl analog called furanyl fentanyl,
according to C4ADS.

Data from 2017 and 2018 show the volume and absolute number of U.S.
seizures of fentanyl-related compounds shipped by mail dropping
drastically after U.S. Customs and Border Protection stepped up its
screening of incoming international packages.

But vendors in China said they have managed to work around the extra
hurdles.

Fentanyl As A Dark Web Profit Center, From Chinese Labs To U.S.
Streets

Shots - Health News

Fentanyl As A Dark Web Profit Center, From Chinese Labs To U.S.
Streets

"We ship a special way, can ensure you can receive the goods. We have
the product in stock," a salesperson for Hebei Speedgain
Biotechnology Co. Ltd. said via WhatsApp in May. The company
describes itself as a maker of drug and pesticide intermediates.

The salesperson said the company also sold a banned fentanyl
precursor, at $1,100 a kilogram.

A salesperson at a different company, Shunwei Biological, based in
Shijiazhuang, said in May that it was still selling two fentanyl
precursors and a range of synthetic cannabinoids to customers in the
United States. "We are shipping to the U.S. and have success with
deliveries to your country and others," the salesperson said.

One possible way around the screening is for vendors to ship large
volumes of illicit synthetic opioids disguised within lawful bulk
cargo to the U.S., where a distributor can then fulfill individual
American orders domestically. In 2017, the DEA arrested a Chinese
national living in Massachusetts and operating such a warehouse of
synthetic opioids and other drugs obtained from China.

China Jails 9 In Fentanyl Trafficking Case That Began With A Tip From
The U.S.

Asia

China Jails 9 In Fentanyl Trafficking Case That Began With A Tip From
The U.S.

"It could be that the mail shipments are down in part because what
has happened is that the vendors have moved to shipping it through
cargo to the United States. ... That data is not being collected
because all the seizures that I see are only from [U.S.] ports of
entry," said Bryce Pardo, who researches drug policy at Rand Corp.

Drug supply chains are changing in other ways as traffickers engage
in a cat-and-mouse game to evade law enforcement.

This year, the coronavirus pandemic temporarily paralyzed the trade.
Many ingredients behind synthetic opioids are made in Wuhan, the city
where the coronavirus was first discovered and which authorities
completely locked down for more than two months.

"The cutoffs were temporary," said Louise Shelley, a George Mason
University professor who researches fentanyl supply chains and
studied the impact of the pandemic on sales. "The problem has not
ended. [Fentanyl sales] are still going on the open Web."

You push on a balloon, it pops somewhere else.

Matt Donahue, Drug Enforcement Administration deputy chief of
operations

In the U.S., meanwhile, more than 40 states have reported spikes in
opioid-related deaths this year, according to the American Medical
Association. Fentanyl, which is up to 100 times stronger than
morphine, is a leading cause of overdoses.

Mexican cartels have also begun distributing fentanyl products, using
ingredients largely made in China. "Now the role of China -- and the
growing role of India -- is sending precursor chemicals directly to
cartels in Mexico to produce the fentanyl in clandestine labs," the
DEA's Donahue said. "You push on a balloon, it pops somewhere else."

More Chinese vendors are moving to password-protected websites, where
access is given only to trusted customers. They are moving away from
public social media accounts, for security reasons and because many
companies, including Instagram and Reddit, have implemented rules
that make it harder for illicit drug vendors to operate. Chen's
Facebook accounts were shut down last year, but he has created a new
account.

Analysts said an entire new class of synthetic opioids -- a family of
compounds called benzimidazoles -- is now showing up in U.S. drug
busts and leading to overdose deaths. The drugs are completely
different in chemical structure from fentanyl, but experts warn they
can be just as deadly. Initial seizures of the drugs come from mailed
packages originating in China, where their production is not
controlled.

"It's still a small amount, but it's alarming because benzimidazoles
could be the kind of new pathway illicit chemists have identified, a
new chemical structure that's not controlled yet and that's harder to
detect because it's new," said Pardo of Rand Corp. "At the end of the
day, these chemists will figure out new things to get around these
laws."

NPR Beijing bureau producer Amy Cheng contributed research from
Beijing. NPR addiction correspondent Brian Mann contributed reporting
from New York.

  * fentanyl precursors
  * fentanyl analog
  * synthetic opioids
  * opioids addiction
  * drug trafficking
  * opioid epidemic
  * opioid
  * fentanyl
  * opioids
  * China

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