UK Edition
At the beginning of April, with the country in the grip of lockdown, police began mounting raids against dozens of high-profile gangsters.
It was initially thought astute police chiefs were simply taking advantage of the unprecedented situation to swoop on wanted criminals because they knew where to find them.
But instead of street soldiers and the usual “low hanging fruit”, many of those arrested appeared to be kingpin criminals thought “untouchable” until now.
The suspects were as baffled as anyone as to why they were suddenly being picked up, perhaps fearing the work of a supergrass. But then, on June 12, some of the most senior members of Britain’s criminal fraternity received a text on their mobiles that made everything clear. The top-secret, encrypted messaging platform EncroChat, which they had for four years used for their business, had been compromised by law enforcement agencies. The message from the shadowy France-based provider was stark: “We can no longer guarantee the security of your device. We advise you to power off and physically dispose of your device immediately.”
But for many of the 10,000 UK users it was too late. The police had already begun kicking down front doors. EncroChat handsets, which cost around £3,000 a year, provided gangsters with a supposedly secure network on which they could deal drugs, order gangland hits, arrange money laundering and carry out their underworld activity.
Emerging in 2016 to replace an end-to-end encrypted service that was disabled, EncroChat became the go-to platform for top-tier criminals.
Britain’s National Crime Agency, with European law enforcement bodies, had spent four years trying to crack the system without success. But in April, cyber specialists working with the French police managed to hack into the network without being detected.
They were able to eavesdrop on millions of chilling messages and harvest a treasure trove of evidence. Nikki Holland, director of investigations at the NCA, said: “It was like getting the keys to Aladdin’s cave”, while her deputy, Matt Horne, likened it to “cracking the criminals’ Enigma code”.
Unaware they were being spied upon, gangland bosses were unwittingly providing evidence the police could have only dreamed of. As well as drug deals and gun running, law enforcement agencies intercepted gangsters as they planned assassination hits.
In one case killers were intercepted on their way to kill a rival drug dealer.
Within weeks, more than 740 suspects had been arrested and millions of pounds in illicit cash, tons of class A drugs and vast caches of firearms seized.
Dozens of raids took place, many at luxurious mansions in wealthy stockbroker belt villages. Scotland Yard went into overdrive, with officers finally able to take down kingpin criminals who had been on their radar for years but were beyond reach due to lack of evidence.
In one raid, Met officers were staggered to find £5 million – their biggest ever single seizure of cash.
Officers from the elite Counter Terrorism Specialist Firearms unit carried out a raid on a Buckinghamshire mansion, arresting one of the country’s most feared suspects. In the North West, police seized a luxury barge belonging to one suspected criminal mastermind.
A source said: “We are talking about the sort of people who from the outside looked like successful businessmen. They lived in gated mansions, with supercars on their drives and their children attended the best private schools.”
Every police force in the country has been involved and the NCA described it as one of the biggest blows to serious organised crime.
EncroChat also had 60,000 international users and police forces in Europe and further afield were busy conducting similar raids, including on Colombian drug cartels and Italian mafia groups that had been attracted to the platform’s security features.
Ms Holland said: “This is the biggest and most significant law enforcement operation of its kind and it is previously unmatched in terms of its scale.
“By monitoring thousands of handsets and analysing millions of messages we have already mitigated threats to life including conspiracy to murder; we have protected the public by taking dangerous firearms and drugs off the streets and we have seized millions of pounds in criminal cash and assets.”
Chief Constable Steve Jupp, the National Police Chiefs’ Council lead for serious organised crime, said the operation was like “having an insider in every organised crime group in the UK”.
In addition to the hundreds of arrests, police also seized £54 million in cash and more than 70 firearms, including an AK47 assault rifle, sub machine guns, handguns and four grenades.
They also impounded more than two tons of class A and B drugs, 55 high-value cars and 73 luxury watches.
But the operation also unearthed a number of corrupt law enforcement officials, the agency revealed.
Dame Cressida Dick, the Met Police Commissioner, said: “This operation is the most significant activity, certainly in my career, we have ever carried out against serious and organised criminality across London.
“Organised crime groups have used encrypted communications to enable their offending. They have openly discussed plots to murder, launder money, deal drugs and sell firearms capable of causing atrocious scenes in our communities. They were brazen and thought they were beyond the reach of the law.”
Ms Holland said: “We have dismantled well established organised crime groups and have already secured evidence to prosecute a significant number of known criminals who have previously remained beyond our reach.
“This will have a lasting and detrimental effect on the criminal underworld that has become reliant on encrypted communication to go about their illicit business.”
And she warned: “If you have one of these devices, be very worried because we are probably coming for you.”
Mr Horne added: “I assess this as the largest ever disruptive impact against organised crime gangs operating at a high level involved in drug importation, drug trafficking, firearm importation and trafficking and money laundering.”
Priti Patel, the Home Secretary, said: “This operation demonstrates that criminals will not get away with using encrypted devices to plot vile crimes under the radar.
“The NCA’s relentless targeting of these gangs has helped to keep us all safe. I congratulate them and law enforcement partners on this significant achievement.
“I will continue working closely with the NCA and others to tackle the use of such devices – giving them the resources, powers and tools they need to keep our country safe.”