The European Serious Organised Crime Centre (ESOCC) at Europol aims to provide the most effective and agile operational support to the EU Member States' investigations in prioritised cases related to serious and organised crime. This encompasses criminal intelligence analysis, provision of specific expertise, deployments in the field, real time information exchange and other capabilities.
ESOCC's primary goal is to deliver operational support to Member States’ priority cases and High Value Target investigations focusing on individuals and poly-criminal networks posing the highest risk of serious and organised crime to the EU. Other core tasks of the department include supporting the EU Policy Cycle through the implementation of EMPACT priorities and developing a strategic intelligence picture on serious and organised crime.
Key objectives
ESOCC is continuously developing and enhancing its internal and external cooperation and coordination, making use of the necessary horizontal services from other Europol departments and national experts from the Member States.
The department is particularly focused on:
- Development of the High Value Target/Operational Task Force (OTF) concept and related OTF grant funding scheme;
- Development of the Analysis Projects (AP) structure;
- Development and use of machine-learning and other relevant ICT tools connected to investigations into serious and organised crime;
- Development of Drugs Liaison Task Force at Europol;
- Developing cooperation with the major harbours in the EU, in relation to serious and organised crime activities;
- Development and implementation of the short-term Seconded National Experts (SNE) concept;
- Implementation of the relevant EU policies on serious and organised crime, based on Europol products such as SOCTA.
Operational highlights
- During 2021 ESOCC provided extensive operational support to 742 Member States’ serious and organised crime investigations. This led to the arrest of over 12 000 suspects and the seizure of over EUR 700 million in cash.
- ESOCC has provided extensive operational support to OTF LIMIT which is a high profile investigation initiated by Belgium, France and the Netherlands. The target of the investigation was Sky Global, a Canadian company with worldwide presence offering sophisticated, encrypted communication services to the users.
- In 2021, ESOCC was instrumental in providing operational support to 16 countries as part of OTF Trojan Shield/Greenlight. It was one of the largest and most sophisticated law enforcement operations to date in the fight against encrypted criminal activities.
Key output
- ESOCC cooperates closely with the other crime centres at Europol, as well as Member States and partners. The EU Serious Organised Crime Threat Assessment report is one of the result of this collaboration. This report is a forward-looking document that assesses shifts in the serious and organised crime landscape.
Structure
ESOCC is composed of three units:
- EU Drugs Unit, which covers drugs, firearms & explosives;
- EU Organised Crime Unit, which covers high risk organised crime groups, environmental crime and property crime;
- European Migrant Smuggling Centre, which covers the facilitation of illegal immigration and trafficking in human beings.
ESOCC includes 14 Analysis Projects. The centre supports the implementation of operational action plans of EMPACT priorities related to high risk criminal networks, drug trafficking, namely synthetic drugs and new psychoactive substances, cocaine, heroin and cannabis, as well as illicit firearms trafficking, facilitation of illegal migration, organised property crimes, trafficking in human beings and environmental crime.
ESOCC has approximately 155 personnel (48 of whom are SNEs) working together with Europol partners across a number of operational areas (January 2022).
Working together
Over the past five years, ESOCC has organised a yearly international drugs conference, which is attended by delegates from EU and non-EU countries and international organisations. The conference focuses on Europe's unprecedented drug situation in order to increase the understanding of the latest trends in illicit drug production and trafficking and to agree on bold law enforcement responses to protect the public from the threats posed by illicit drugs. A Drugs Program Board meets a few times a year to review trends and ongoing operational topics.
ESOCC is leading or taking part in many crime-fighting initiatives coordinated at EU or global level, such as EMPACT or the Operational Network project (ONNET). The main focus of ESOCC is to assist the EU and other countries on operational investigations and to facilitate expertise among law enforcement authorities.