One of the world’s largest and among the best funded police organizations, Interpol initiated a crackdown on cybercrime in the African continent in conjunction with Afripol, AU’s police organization.
In a statement release, Interpol clarified that they had arrested 1,006 suspects over the two-month manhunt operation dubbed ‘Operation Serengeti’ which ran from September 2nd to October 31st. 19 African countries were involved in the exercise targeting criminals responsible of ransomware, business email compromise, digital extortion and online scams.
“From multi-level marketing scams to credit card fraud on an industrial scale, the increasing volume and sophistication of cybercrime attacks is of serious concern,” said the Secretary General of Interpol, Valdecy Urquiza.
Interpol’s Assistant Director of Cybercrime Operations reported that Serengeti’s results were a drastic increase compared to previous operations held in Africa. In the last years, cybercrime operations by Interpol only led to 25 arrests.
“Significant progress has been made with participating countries enhancing their ability to work with intelligence and produce meaningful results,” said Enrique Hernandez Gonzalez, the Assistant Director.
Interpol collaborated with Kenyan police and made nearly two dozen arrests of individuals involved in online credit card fraud. Reportedly, such cases were linked to Sh. 1.1 billion ($8.6 million) losses.
They noted that Kenyans would steal these funds through fraudulent scripts run by altering the banking system’s security protocol. The looters would immediately channel the monies via SWIFT to companies in UAE, Nigeria and China.
The final destination for the funds would be to digital asset institutions offering trading and financial services regulated in several countries, Kenya included.
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“Through Serengeti, Afripol has significantly enhanced support for law enforcement in African Union Member States,” said Jalel Chelba, Afripol’s Executive Director, adding that their focus is now on emerging threats such as AI driven malware and advanced cybersecurity techniques.
The global police organization’s mission was seemingly a success as they also disclosed that they dismantled 134,000 malicious infrastructure and networks in the operation.
Major crackdowns recently took place in several countries. In Senegal, eight people were arrested, including five Chinese nationals, for their involvement in a Ponzi scheme. In Cameroon, a group suspected of using multi-level marketing scams for human trafficking was taken down.
In Angola, an international criminal group operating an illegal virtual casino was dismantled. In Nigeria, a cryptocurrency investment scam was also shut down.
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