Image: Fishing boat at the harbour – Paul Einerhand

A new report claims that the marine insurance industry is enabling illegal and environmentally destructive behaviour in the fishing sector by insuring vessels that deliberately disable their tracking systems — a practice known as “going dark.”

In 2023, Blue Marine investigators revealed how industrial fishing vessels were routinely turning off their Automatic Identification Systems (AIS) to conceal illegal activity, including unlicensed fishing in protected or foreign waters. The new research, published in 2024, links this practice to the continued support of the marine insurance sector, which often provides coverage to these non-compliant vessels despite their history of limited transparency.

“Without accountability from insurers, dark vessel activity continues to thrive at the expense of people and the planet — often in violation of both international and EU law,” the report states.

The paper also calls out UK regulators, including the Prudential Regulation Authority and the Financial Conduct Authority, for failing to address how the financial sector is implicated in illegal maritime activity. By not holding insurers accountable, the report argues, regulators are allowing vessels that present serious collision and environmental risks to operate with impunity.

Despite growing ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) commitments from the financial sector, the report highlights a gap between public sustainability pledges and actual underwriting practices. The report argues that insuring vessels that routinely go dark, often in high-risk or protected marine zones, contradicts insurers’ climate and human rights responsibilities.

The report urges insurers to “stop covering vessels that disable tracking systems,” and demands stricter oversight to curb what it describes as “greenwashing” in the industry.