FBI San Diego quietly dropped a big boast into local feeds this week, resharing a post on X that claimed the bureau and its partners had a record year in 2025, bringing crimes against children to justice. The thread touted hundreds of arrests and thousands of child victims identified or located nationwide. By amplifying the national numbers, the local field office effectively invited San Diegans to ask what those sweeping figures mean closer to home.
Federal Sting’s Official Tally
The Justice Department’s December 19 press release on “Operation Relentless Justice,” a two-week nationwide enforcement surge, reported that agents located 205 child victims and arrested 293 alleged offenders during that operation, which involved all 56 FBI field offices, according to the Justice Department. The release highlights victim services, coordination with the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, and a reminder that indictments are only allegations while cases move through the courts.
What the Bureau’s Post Claimed
The social post that FBI San Diego reshared is a retweet of a thread by @FBIDirectorKash that steps back to a broader year-end view. That thread says the FBI and its partners “identified and located” more than 6,000 children in 2025, dismantled hundreds of networks, listed there as 764, removed millions of accounts from dark-web forums, and arrested hundreds of suspected predators, as posted by FBI San Diego. The thread also credits senior leadership at the Justice Department and the administration for supporting those enforcement efforts.
In 2025 the @FBI and partners delivered a record year bringing crimes against children to justice.We identified and located over 6,000 missing kids, took millions of pedophile accounts off the dark web, dismantled 764 networks, arrested hundreds of child predators, and more.… pic.twitter.com/A8wcJBSfUk
— FBI Director Kash Patel (@FBIDirectorKash) February 5, 2026
Numbers and Context
The totals depend heavily on what time window is being counted. A single enforcement surge like Operation Relentless Justice generates one set of statistics, while an aggregate year-end tally produces a much larger one. In separate congressional testimony, the FBI director offered another snapshot, listing roughly 4,700 child victims identified and located and about 1,500 child predators arrested for a similar reporting period, illustrating how figures can shift with the reporting frame, according to the FBI. Distinguishing operation-level results from year-to-date totals is key to understanding what each number is really counting.
San Diego’s Role
The San Diego field office has been part of those nationwide pushes as well as regional investigations targeting alleged child predators. Coverage of the FBI’s “Summer Heat” campaign earlier in 2025 shows the San Diego office made 76 arrests and helped identify or locate seven child victims as part of that operation, according to NBC 7 San Diego. The field office says it will keep working with federal, state, and local partners to investigate and disrupt child-exploitation networks in the region.
How to Report Tips
Officials are urging anyone with information to use established reporting channels. The FBI San Diego field office lists its main phone number and an online tipline on its website, and federal releases also point the public to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children’s hotline. For local contact details, see FBI San Diego…