Approximately 520,000 counterfeit or unapproved aircraft parts enter the aviation supply chain annually, and the AOG Technics scandal proved current traceability systems cannot detect forged documentation

An estimated 2% of the global aircraft parts supply -- roughly 520,000 components per year -- consists of counterfeit or unapproved parts. The AOG Technics fraud case, which concluded in UK Southwark Crown Court on December 1, 2025, revealed that thousands of CFM56 engine parts were sold with forged airworthiness certificates between 2019 and 2023, affecting over 180 engines installed on aircraft operated by United Airlines, Southwest Airlines, Ryanair, and Virgin Australia. Why it matters: Forged documentation passed through established MRO (Maintenance, Repair, and Overhaul) supply chains undetected for years, so airlines unknowingly installed unverified engine parts on revenue passenger flights, so the airworthiness of hundreds of aircraft was compromised without operators' knowledge, so airlines had to conduct costly emergency inspections and ground aircraft to remove suspect parts (disrupting operations and costing millions), so the entire paper-based parts traceability system -- including FAA Form 8130-3 airworthiness certificates -- was proven to be fundamentally forgeable. The structural root cause is that aircraft parts traceability still relies on paper or PDF certificates that can be fabricated with basic desktop publishing tools, there is no centralized digital verification database linking OEM serial numbers to real-time custody chains, and the fragmented global supply chain involving thousands of brokers, distributors, and repair stations in dozens of jurisdictions makes comprehensive auditing practically impossible.