8 websites claiming to represent this registry
Malawi
Ship Registry
Malawi is a landlocked country in southern Africa. It does not operate a maritime flag state registry for ocean-going vessels. The Government of Malawi confirmed this to the IMO in June 2025 and reported the fraud to INTERPOL for investigation of individuals who posed as public officers and certified ships as Malawian-registered. The matter was circulated through IMO Circular Letter No.5040.
The marinegov.net domain — specifically malawi.marinegov.net — hosted a fake Malawi Ship Registry that is no longer accessible. A parallel .org infrastructure (marinegov.org, malawi.marinegov.org, malawi.shipregistry.marinegov.org) runs static clones of the .net sites and remains active as of March 2026. The .org infrastructure shares IP 159.198.36.123 with Pandas network sites, suggesting the two networks share an operator. The fraudsters used a fake government seal on documents. The following vessels were specifically identified in Circular Letter No.5040:
- Ascendant (IMO 9248801)
- Phoenix (IMO 9333424)
- Sierra (IMO 9522324)
- Reinel, formerly known as Afkada (IMO 9311531)
- Cai Yun (IMO 9437983)
- Agni (IMO 9314167)
As of February 2026, 8 ships remained fraudulently flying the Malawi flag (tankers, average tonnage 55,758 GT), reduced from 27 in September 2025.