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Source: NATO
On Thursday, 7 September 2023, the NATO Secretary General, Mr. Jens Stoltenberg, will receive the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, Ms. Hanke Bruins Slot, at NATO Headquarters.
There will be no media opportunity.
Photographs will be available on the NATO website after the event.
For more information:
Follow us on Twitter (@NATO, @jensstoltenberg and @NATOPress)
Source: Europol
Award for operational analysis targeting DDoS attacks The first category awards an analyst, or team of analysts, for delivering outstanding operational analysis. The winning analysis shed light on an investigation targeting criminal activity that fell within Europol’s mandate. The award for Operational Analyst 2023 went to the Cybercrime Investigations Team of the Regional Criminal Police in Hessen, Germany (Hessisches Landeskriminalamt)…
Source: Europol
In January 2022, the Belgrade Department of the Serbian Criminal Police initiated an investigation into this drug cartel, believed to be involved in the wholesale trafficking of cocaine from South America to the EU. The law enforcement activities against this network extended to authorities across the EU and beyond, resulting in a large international investigation coordinated by Europol. The targeted…
Source: NATO
DIANA – the Defence Innovation Accelerator for the North Atlantic – has received proposals from over 1,200 applicants as part of its pilot challenge call to innovators and entrepreneurs. DIANA’s first challenges – which closed at the end of last week (25 August 2023) – focus on three priorities: energy resilience; sensing and surveillance; and secure information sharing.
Companies – many of them small start-ups – are competing for hundreds of thousands of euros in grant funds. Applicants will be evaluated by expert panels drawn from across NATO and industry, and DIANA expects to be able to issue the first grants to innovators towards the end of the year. The DIANA team will then work directly with the successful applicants – helping them to test their ideas, secure further funding and get commercial advice to help their businesses grow.
“My team and I are delighted with the overwhelming response and positivity from the Alliance’s innovators to DIANA’s first three challenges,” said DIANA’s Managing Director, Professor Deeph Chana. “It is testament to the hard work of the DIANA team – of which I’m extremely proud – and the significant talent pool that we know exists within the Alliance.”
Once DIANA is fully operational in 2025, it will run multiple challenges per year on various topics, with the capacity to work with hundreds of innovators each year across its network of accelerator sites and test centres. “The entire team and myself are looking forward to engaging with the successful candidates,” continued Professor Chana. ”We hope to expand on the success of our pilot programme in future years.”
For more information visit DIANA’s website: www.diana.nato.int
Source: Europol
Headline: Two arrested in France for major CEO fraud
House searches in France have led to the arrests of two individuals suspected of large-scale CEO fraud. The criminals belonged to an organised crime group involved in at least 24 cases of CEO fraud causing EUR 4.6 million worth of damage. With the support of Europol, the French National Gendarmerie carried out the searches in Paris and Lille and made the subsequent arrests on 20 February 2018.
Source: Europol
Headline: Free data recovery kit for victims of GandCrab ransomware now available on No More Ransom
As of today, a new decryption tool for victims of the GandCrab ransomware is available on www.nomoreransom.org. This tool has been released by the Romanian Police (IGPR) under the supervision of the General Prosecutor’s Office (DIICOT) and in collaboration with the internet security company Bitdefender and Europol.
First detected one month ago, GandCrab has already made 50 000 victims worldwide, a vast number of which in Europe, making it one of the most aggressive forms of ransomware so far this year.
Source: Europol
Headline: You have identified 70 objects taken from child sexual abuse images
We still need your help with 25 new objects uploaded to Europol’s website today
This morning Europol uploaded 25 new objects to its Stop Child Abuse – Trace an Object webpage. The objects are all taken from the background of child sexual abuse images. Since the launch of this project, where we ask the general public for information about the origin of the objects, you have sent us more than 18 300 tips. This information was carefully processed by Europol’s European Cybercrime Centre (EC3) and has proven to be extremely useful. Thanks to your information, 70 objects have been identified.
Of those 70 objects, 25 were identified to one or a reasonable number of likely countries of production. This means that we are almost certain that the image containing child sexual abuse was produced in those countries. All of your tips for these 25 objects have been transmitted to these countries and several investigations are currently ongoing. These investigations are very complex and can take months, even years, but these tips are very important as they can be the vital clue that acts as the starting point for an investigation or links other pieces of evidence.
The other 45 objects you identified have unfortunately not led to a specific location because they are present in a large number of countries all over the world. These identifications are still extremely useful for law enforcement because they eliminate an investigative trail. That alone allows the investigators to spend more time and resources on other leads with a higher potential for success.
Europol and its law enforcement partners would like to thank everyone who has taken the effort to visit www.europol.europa.eu/stopchildabuse and is equally committed to tracing these objects and ultimately helping to stop child abuse.
Source: Europol
Headline: 12 arrested and 4 women safeguarded in Spain and the UK in operation against sexual exploitation of women
The members of the human trafficking ring recruited the victims in Nigeria using voodoo threats
The Spanish National Police, supported by Europol, the National Crime Agency (NCA) and the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) from Nigeria, have safeguarded four Nigerian women who were forced into prostitution in different Spanish locations. The dismantled network operated mainly in Spain, but also in Italy, the United Kingdom, Libya, Niger and Nigeria.
The investigation to dismantle the network began one year ago. The members of the criminal network recruited their victims by coercing them with voodoo threats in Benin City, Nigeria. The women were forced to eat a raw chicken heart and drink whisky as the criminals took clippings of their hair and nails. The criminals then used fraudulent documents to traffic the women to Europe, where they were housed in squalid conditions in Italy for several days. Once in Spain the women were hidden in their madam’s houses and forced to clean and take care of the children, whilst the organised crime group made arrangements for the submission of applications for asylum by the victims. This was necessary to ensure the victims would be more likely to remain in Spain.
The ring leaders were based in Torrelavega, Spain. They controlled the whole network from the city and if the women could not pay their debts their family was threatened by phone. The organised crime group operated in four different places in Spain. The investigation revealed that some members of the ring were acting from Italy and the UK. A European Arrest Warrant was issued by Spain and a house search took place in the UK as one of the individuals was living in Manchester. Thanks to the support of the NCA, the individual in Manchester was arrested, alongside seven in Cantabria, two in Vizcaya and two in Alicante, all in Spain.
Europol supported the investigation by providing information exchange and analytical support. On the action day two analysts were deployed to Spain equipped with a mobile office and a data extraction device. This allowed for real-time information exchange and cross-checks of the data gathered during the course of the action against Europol’s databases.
Source: Europol
Headline: Over 41 000 artefacts seized in global operation targeting the illicit trafficking of cultural goods
Over 41 000 cultural goods such as coins, paintings and drawings, furniture and musical instruments, porcelain, archaeological and paleontological objects, books and manuscripts and sculptures were seized all over the world as a result of coordinated law enforcement actions. These seizures were made during the first Global Global Customs-Police Operation, codenamed ATHENA and organised by the World Customs Organisation (WCO) in cooperation with INTERPOL, and during the regional Europe-focused Operation PANDORA II, coordinated by the Spanish Guardia Civil and Europol.
Both operations took place from October to early December 2017, with a common action phase from 20 to 30 November 2017, and saw the involvement of customs and police forces from 81 countries. Both, ATHENA and PANDORA II, focused on the illicit trafficking of cultural objects, theft, looting as well as internet sales. Most of the actions were developed and coordinated jointly between Customs and Police on the national level with the support and participation of the experts from the Ministries of Culture and other relevant institutions and law enforcement agencies.
Apart from seizures, there have been tens of thousands of checks and controls in various airports, ports, other border crossing points, as well as in the auction houses, museums and private houses. As a result, more than 200 investigations were opened and 53 persons arrested.
Given the global nature of this crime, operation coordination units working 24/7 were established by Europol on one side, and the WCO and INTERPOL on the other, to support the exchange of information as well as disseminate alerts, warnings and perform cross- checks in different international and national databases.
Internet has changed, as in many other fields of our society, the traditional chains of the illicit trade of cultural goods. It is a new challenge for law enforcement authorities especially for the specialized cultural goods crime units. Now the criminals can reach the collector’s (anywhere in the world) without any intermediate, and out of the traditional channels.
Facing this threat, the involved law enforcement agencies monitored thousands of market places, internet announcement has in order to detect and seize looted or stolen cultural goods. Only in this area, 63 new criminal investigations have been opened and more than 6 000 cultural objects have been seized.
In a single successful investigation in Spain, Guardia Civil seized more than 2 000 cultural objects. Most of them were coins from Roman and other Empires and archaeological objects made of ceramic, metal and stone. In addition, 88 pieces of ivory were seized during the searches, including a carving of Christ valued at EUR 6 000 , and 39 firearms of different classification, from historical weapons, such as rifles and shotguns, swords, swords, katanas and a crossbow, revolvers and pistols. The investigation started with the checks of various internet pages dedicated to the sale and purchase of objects of historical value, and is still ongoing.
The Hellenic Police conducted a fruitful investigation in the framework of PANDORA II: during the searches in two residences and in two businesses of a national entrepreneur, they found 41 archaeological objects, for which the collector did not have a corresponding license. Additionally, from a legal collection of 1 133 coins of silver, bronze and gold of the 2nd century B.C. until 200 A.C., 15 coins were missing, and from a legal collection of 105 ancient objects, 26 objects were missing. All the possessed objects of archaeological and cultural value were confiscated, namely 1 252 cultural goods.
Source: Europol
Headline: EU AND ISRAELI POLICE JOIN FORCES AGAINST SOCIAL ENGINEERING
Last week EU and the Israeli Police organised an EU expert workshop on social engineering. Experts from Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France and Germany took part in the event with the aim of improving future information exchange between Israeli law enforcement and EU Member States.
The main activities covered at the event included comparing business email compromise attacks (BEC – also known as CEO fraud) both in EU Member States and Israel; examining best practice for cross-border investigations; and discussing new methods to counteract CEO/BEC fraud1. The workshop also looked at policing methods for network-based crime through networked organisations; improving capabilities in combatting CEO fraud; and enhancing cooperation in the field of CEO/BEC fraud between Europol and other law enforcement agencies in EU Member States.
These kinds of cases started in early 2010 with MTIC fraud (Missing Trader Intra-Community, also called missing trader fraud) with carbon credits. CEO fraud cases came soon after, followed by binary options fraud2 or FOREX scams3. EU law enforcement agencies, together with the Israeli Police, have since succeeded in arresting the money mules responsible. Investigators, EU experts and Israeli authorities arranged this event to find quicker ways of exchanging information and to build on achievements so far.
1 CEO/BEC fraud involves criminals impersonating company executives and tricking other employees into carrying out unauthorised wire transfers.
2 Binary options fraud is a fictitious short-term investment fraud.
3 FOREX scams are trading schemes used to defraud traders by convincing them to expect a high profit by trading in the foreign exchange market.