746 arrested after Messages on Enrochat decoded, 2 tonnes of drugs,12 guns,£54m cash seized
A top-secret communication system EncroChat used by criminals to trade drugs and guns has been successfully penetrated according to the National Crime Agency.
746 arrests after messages on Encrochat were decoded, leading to the seizure of two tonnes drugs, several dozen guns, and £54m in suspect cash. The NCA teamed with forces across Europe on the UK’s biggest and most significant law enforcement operation.
The NCA says the Europe-wide operation which lasted three months involved police forces across the UK, has had the biggest impact on organised crime gangs it has ever seen.
The Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Dame Cressida Dick, whose force made 132 of the arrests and seized £13.3 cash said the operation was a “game-changer, and this was just the beginning. We will be disrupting organised criminal networks as a result of these operations for weeks and months and possibly years to come”.
France-based EncroChat which has over 60,000 subscribers, among them 10, 000 is now been taken down.
The system provided “worry-free secure communications” and featured self-destructing messages that deleted from the recipient’s device after a certain length of time., and even panic wide where all the data could be deleted by entering a four-digit code from the lock screen, operated on customised Android phones.
The NCA says the messaging system has been used as a criminal marketplace to co-ordinate the supply of Class A drugs across the world and import weapons including assault rifles. Sub-machine guns, shotguns, pistols, and hand grenades.
Gangs are also believed to have used the handheld devices to plot attacks on rival groups plan ways of enforcing drug debts and arrange for money to be laundered, including a threat to life by acid attacks and threats to chop off limbs. The bulk of the arrests in London and North-West England.
In London, those targeted in the Met operation codenamed “Eternal” are alleged to include members of high harm organised crime networks with longstanding links to violent crime and drug dealing.
The force also identified a plot by international drugs and firearms gang to shoot dead a member of a rival gang network and managed to prevent the shooting by arresting an individual for conspiracy to murder and seizing a loaded pistol which was believed to be the planned murder weapon.