The EU police agency Europol has launched a new unit to intensify its pursuit of people smugglers across the bloc. The new center will focus on identifying smuggling operations in the digital realm, as more and more criminal rings have taken their recruitment and operations online.
Europol says that its new unit named "European Center Against Migrant Smuggling" (ECAMS) will use data to help "smash" the business model of criminal gangs which smuggle people across borders into the European Union.
Europol said that ECAMS, which will be based at Europol's headquarters in The Hague, will primarily interpret data gathered from EU member states and their partners to map criminal networks and identify their leaders and lynchpins.
"The creation of this specialist center is propelled by the evolving operational, strategic, and structural requirements that stem from Europol's enhanced mandate to intensify efforts against migrant smuggling," Europol said in a statement.
ECAMS will work closely with Frontex, the EU's external border agency, and will focus on using data and open-source intelligence to investigate and persecute transnational smuggling gangs.
Furthermore, it will also trace the profits of smugglers as part of inspections at financial institutions across the EU, with a focus on tracking and tracing illicit digital transactions.
According to EU Home Affairs Commissioner Magnus Brunner, roughly 90 percent of migrants coming to the EU irregularly are now relying on using the services of smugglers, further highlighting the importance of dismantling these criminal networks.
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Focus on trailing financial transactions
Since smuggling networks reinvest a portion of their profits into expanding their operations and growing their infrastructure, ECAMS expects to apprehend smugglers by following the money trail. It is uncertain, however, to what extent this particular approach may succeed, as many smugglers have increasingly turned to using cryptocurrencies for their transactions, which are difficult to trace.
Smugglers typically charge thousands of euros or more to bring migrants into Europe on life-threatening journeys on land and at sea, with many of their recruitment tactics having also increasingly moved online.
According to Europol, ECAMS will build on the work of the European Migrant Smuggling Center, which was launched a decade ago to stop irregular migration; since its inception in 2016, it has helped lead to the arrests of thousands of suspected smugglers, Europol explained.
In 2025 alone, the police body conducted nearly 200 raids and operations against migrant smugglers across the bloc.
Smugglers treat migrants as 'commodities'
Europol Executive Director Catherine De Bolle said in a statement that in order for the EU police agency to succeed in stopping irregular migration, it is "essential that our actions remains agile, underpinned by strong operational intelligence and close cooperation at a a global level."
"Migrant smuggling networks are operating with increasing complexity, both online and offline," she stressed, adding that for the criminal networks moving migrants, "people are not human beings; they are commodities.
Smuggling networks have become a "global, digital and highly profitable criminal business," she further elaborated, adding that they are becoming "increasingly violent" too.
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with AFP, dpa