Drug trafficking

SPECIAL - How Can Analytics Change The World Of 'Narcos'?

You won’t hear analytics or data management mentioned in the hit Netflix show “Narcos.” Spanning 1975 to the early 1990’s, the show depicts the rise of Medellin Cartel kingpin Pablo Escobar and the efforts by Colombian authorities, the US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) and others to bring him down.

The story is narrated by a DEA agent character and details many of the strategies the agency used to attempt to infiltrate and dismantle Escobar’s complex networks. Of course, as a television show it takes dramatic liberties with how things actually went down, but does depict some tried and true investigative approaches.

Surveillance, wire-taps, interrogations, informants—these are all valuable intelligence gathering techniques that are still in use today. But modern law enforcement and federal agents are aided by a new technology: analytics. Since the September 11, 2001 attacks, federal, state and local agencies have stepped up information sharing, as data analysis technologies have dramatically increased in sophistication and scalability.