Middle East Oil Tankers Are Going Dark for Longer

Not only is a growing number of tankers moving stealthily with transponders switched off at the Middle East’s two key chokepoints, but the time of the so-called dark mode movements has extended from just a few hours to a week and even more, as shipping risks in the region have increased. Oil tankers have been increasingly using the dark mode to transit through the Strait of Hormuz, switching off their positioning to avoid detection while transiting the chokepoint. Now this activity has spread to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, too, where the Iran-aligned…