Uncovering Illegal Weapons Trafficking Trends in Latin America Through Open Source Research

This report presents the SALW Dashboard, an OSINT-driven, GIS-mapped database of small arms and light weapons incidents in Latin America and the Caribbean, detailing its collection methods (Google dorking, social media monitoring, curated account lists, AI-assisted scraping), strict inclusion criteria, geolocation and reverse-image verification, and editorial quality control. The dataset enables pattern discovery, revealing trafficking flows from the U.S. civilian market (AR-15/AR-10 rifles), state-diverted explosives among criminal groups in Venezuela, Colombia, and Ecuador, and a growing influx of Turkish-made firearms into Brazil, with illustrative seizures near the Brazil–Paraguay border and in Rio de Janeiro.