"Police Bust $41m Email Scam Gang"
A coordinated police operation across multiple countries recently led to the dismantling of a criminal network responsible for tens of millions of dollars in business email compromise (BEC) losses. Europol stated that there were five action days that took place between January 2022 and 2023 in France and Israel, leading to eight house searches and eight arrests, including the alleged Israeli gang leader. Europol noted that police also seized electronic equipment and vehicles, $3.4m from Portuguese bank accounts, $1.2m from Hungarian bank accounts, $641,000 from Croatian bank accounts, $427,000 from Spanish bank accounts, and $374,000 in virtual currencies. The group is said to have targeted victims in France. Europol stated that a resulting investigation revealed money mules operating for the gang in Croatia, Portugal, and Hungary. BEC has been the most lucrative form of cybercrime for the past few years, making fraud gangs billions in profits. The wide-ranging operation to track down the Franco-Israeli gang involved the Croatian National Police, the Croatian Anti Money Laundering Office, the French National Police, the French Gendarmerie, the Hungarian Budapest Metropolitan Police, the Israel Police, the Portuguese Judicial Police, and the Spanish National Police.