Police claim to have arrested a criminal network believed to have laundered more than €180 million ($198 million) in drug trafficking profits after analyzing the decrypted messages.
Europol said it supported a joint investigation by the Belgian federal judicial police Leuven and Spain’s Guardia Civil.
Moroccan, Spanish, and Belgian organized crime groups appear to have operated in Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, South America, and Dubai.
During the Action Day in March 2023, five people were arrested in Belgium and one in Spain, with €1.2 million ($1.3 million) in cryptocurrency, three assets, €50,000 ($55,000) in cash and a car stolen. Luxury cars, multiple luxury watches, jewelry, 23 phones, 3 safe deposit boxes, and a money calculator.
The investigation began in October 2021, when police analyzed messages sent over the popular criminal communications network Sky ECC and cracked the service’s encryption.
For more information on the criminal communications network, get drug dealers 27 years after police cracked EncroChat communications.
This uncovered a massive cocaine trafficking operation that transported cocaine in bulk from South America to ports and airports in Europe, using insiders in various locations to make shipments of several tons.
According to Europol, the group managed to stay in hiding using a series of cover companies until police obtained the decrypted Sky ECC messages.
The money was laundered primarily through cryptocurrency and luxury real estate investments in the EU and Morocco, as well as through underground banking systems.
Europol said it assisted the investigation with its expertise in money laundering and cryptocurrencies.
Sky ECC was the flagship product of Canadian telecommunications service provider Sky Global. According to US indictments filed against CEO Jean-Francois Eap and former distributor Thomas Herdman, the company has made hundreds of millions of dollars by providing police-impenetrable end-to-end encrypted communications.
The company has been accused of turning a blind eye to the criminal activities of many of its users, and has also been accused of setting up shell companies to hide its profits.
Europol claimed it had access to hundreds of millions of chats sent by Sky ECC’s 70,000 global users, helping thwart more than 100 planned criminal operations.
