Name: We Tracked Iran’s Secret Ghost Ships Transferring Oil at Sea
Uploaded: 2026-05-29T13:00:00Z
Duration: 7 min 21 s
Description: A so-called ‘shadow fleet’ sits anchored in waters off Malaysia–many of them ‘ghost’ tankers carrying Iranian oil to China using covert tactics to evade U.S. sanctions and a blockade of Iranian ports.

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A so-called ‘shadow fleet’ sits anchored in waters off Malaysia–many of them ‘ghost’ tankers carrying Iranian oil to China using covert tactics to evade U.S. sanctions and a blockade of Iranian ports. Photo: Sash Alexander/WSJ

https://m.wsj.net/video/20260529/47486d78-9d6b-400e-95ac-512cf38b83f9/1/hls/manifest-hd-wifi.m3u8

A so-called ‘shadow fleet’ sits anchored in waters off Malaysia–many of them ‘ghost’ tankers carrying Iranian oil to China using covert tactics to evade U.S. sanctions and a blockade of Iranian ports.

We Tracked Iran’s Secret Ghost Ships Transferring Oil at Sea

Behind me is our first ship-to-ship transfer. Up to 2 million barrels of oil are being transferred from one of the ships to the other. Off the southeast coast of Malaysia, one of the world's busiest shipping corridors hides a surprisingly open secret: tankers tied to Iran, sanctioned oil trade moved through these waters largely unchecked. It's been labeled a shadow fleet, a loose network of mainly aging and rusting ghost vessels that blend into the region's heavy shipping traffic, carrying crude bound for China, and it's brazen. These ships use a variety of tactics to stay under the radar, switching off tracking signals, using fake paperwork, and, of course, transferring oil between vessels to mask where it comes from. But on April 12th, President Trump announced a blockade on all Iranian ports.

At 10 o'clock tomorrow we have a blockade going into effect. Other nations are working so that Iran will not be able to sell oil.

Almost two months into the blockade, we wanted to see if Iran's sanctioned oil network was still operational.

We've tracked over 120 tankers laden with Iranian oil in this anchorage since the start of the war. It's on the order of 150 million barrels of oil floating out there, just, you know, at present time.

Charlie Brown has spent a lot of time monitoring the movements of these ghost ships.

One of the first tools to use is the AIS information that ships broadcast, and the primary purpose of that is for ship-to-ship communication so that two ships can avoid a collision. Some of the most important telltale signs, just as they often and regularly turn off their AIS and go dark, and that is just a sign that they're wanting to not be observed. Another very important one is spoofing. So a ship can use software to basically create a false AIS track that, when we look at it on our computer screens, may look realistic, but if you are cross-referencing to that other sources of data, especially satellite imagery, you can determine that that's a fake.

These vessels travel from Iran across to Southeast Asia via the Strait of Malacca and the Singapore Strait, which form the world's largest oil transit choke point. In the first half of 2025, about 23 million barrels of oil moved through here every single day. Almost a third of all seaborne oil trade globally. Eventually these tankers drop anchor just east of the Malaysian Peninsula and will go dark while waiting to transfer their cargo.

It's called the Eastern Outer Port Limits or EOPL. It's an area that is outside of Malaysian territorial waters, so it's international waters and they can anchor there without being disrupted by the authorities.

The other tankers that take on the oil will switch their AIS on and transfer their cargo to ports in Northern China, such as Shandong and Dalian.

Right now, we're exiting the Singapore Strait, an important trade artery that connects the Indian Ocean to the Pacific Ocean, and that's where all these tankers float through.

Out here, you're one vessel among hundreds, nobody's looking for you.

We've arrived at our destination. The Eastern Outer Port Limits anchorage, and this is where ships laden with Iranian oil come to make transfers. We've encountered our first Iranian ship here. This is the Ceres. You can see it's low in the water, which means it's carrying a lot of oil.

Many ships we saw were just like the Ceres, looking rusty, possibly falsely flagged, and lacking upkeep. Besides flouting sanctions, these ships pose a very real threat politically and environmentally. As we journeyed further north, the weather conditions deteriorated. Behind me is the NORA, one of the most notorious vessels in Iran's shadow fleet. This was an Iranian-flagged ship a few years ago. Recently it's falsely used the flag of Guyana. It's been detained by the Malaysians in January, but then it was released with a slap on the wrist and then came back here, delivered some oil to a vessel that then took it to China. As you can see, the NORA, which has already been going through many different transformations over the last eight years, it's seemingly in the midst of a new one, so its name is now painted over and you wouldn't really know it was the NORA, except it seems like the paint job hasn't quite finished.

This is this little epicenter of lawlessness where they flout all rules and regulations in order to do transfers and to use it as for floating storage. It's my understanding that Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia are well aware of the presence of these tankers, but firstly, the sanctions are unilateral, so they don't apply to those three countries. Secondly, it's in the Exclusive Economic Zone. It's not in their territorial waters, which means that they technically don't have maritime jurisdiction. It's a really complex problem, and this is a solution that's being sought to a new and evolving problem.

We've made it to the northern part of the zone now. The weather has cleared up a bit and behind me is our first ship-to-ship transfer. Up to 2 million barrels of oil are being transferred from one of the ships to the other.

Ship-to-ship transfers are perfectly normal and widely used within the shipping community, but they nearly always take place in the port with permission of port authorities because it's quite a specialized and environmentally sensitive action to undertake. If something goes wrong, obviously there's going to be an oil spill, so for it to happen in international waters, that's a deliberate deceptive practice in order to avoid scrutiny.

The United States is trying to choke Iran off from its oil wealth, but what we've seen here is that there are still tens of millions of barrels of Iranian oil on the water. Ultimately, that means billions of dollars flowing back into Iran.

The question is, can they sustain the current levels of blockade? That's a question really for the US military, whether or not they want to sustain it, and it's going to be influenced by the geopolitical events and peace talks.

For all the surveillance, sanctions, and US pressure, this shadow trade persists through a maritime gray zone stretching from the Persian Gulf to Southeast Asia, and as long as buyers remain, ships like these will keep sailing.

News moves fast, and there's not always time to untangle the complex forces driving the day's biggest stories. WSJ Explains breaks down big market moves, business and economic trends, and scientific developments to help you stay ahead of the curve.