Environmental crime in the age of climate change: 2022 threat assessment

This is Europol’s latest threat assessment on environmental crime. Environmental crime has become a key threat to global security and a profitable criminal activity, as much in the EU as worldwide. Crimes against the environment threaten the survival of all living species and have an enormous financial impact, which is set to increase further. Opportunities for high profits, legal discrepancies among countries, low risk of detection and marginal penalties make environmental crime a very attractive business for criminal entrepreneurs. 
This report combines the analytical results of the 2021 Serious and Organised Crime Threat Assessment (SOCTA) with the operational intelligence gathered by Europol, in order to provide the most comprehensive analysis of environmental crime threats targeting the EU.