The EU-SOCTA report is Europol’s flagship analysis that provides a comprehensive overview of the threats posed by serious and organised crime in Europe. The report is based on contributions from EU Member States and third parties, and Europol’s expertise. The report offers strategic insights to shape EU policies and law enforcement action.
What stands out today, and will take even more prominence tomorrow, is how serious and organised crime is progressively destabilising, increasingly nurtured online, and strongly accelerated by Artificial Intelligence (AI) and other new technologies.
Digital piracy
Digital content piracy increasingly overlaps with cybercrime, as criminals use various technical means to breach both intellectual property and data security. The expansion and improvement of internet bandwidth in countries outside the EU will likely lead to a further outsourcing of dedicated servers that host and offer video and live streaming content, thus, creating jurisdictional challenges.
Criminal networks often lease servers from legitimate hosting provider companies to ensure the anonymity and scalability of their operations. Others establish their own servers which may be outsourced to other criminal networks as a service. The increased use of anonymisation tools such as VPNs to avoid server blocks ordered by judicial or law enforcement authorities will continue to be a default modus operandi.
Criminal actors also rely on a variety of professional expertise, mainly associated to information technology (IT) services such as technicians who build, operate and optimise the software and digital infrastructure for illegal streaming.
Digital pirates may steal or purchase login credentials from legitimate subscribers — often sourced via phishing scams or data breaches — and then repackage multiple over-the- top libraries into a single, unauthorized service. They often use specialised software or devices to intercept and record live or on-demand streams, relaying the pirated content through internet protocol television (IPTV) servers or file-sharing platforms.
Artificial intelligence
Europol concluded that AI and other new technologies such as blockchain or quantum computing are a catalyst for crime, and drive criminal operations’ efficiency by amplifying their speed, reach, and sophistication.
As AI-driven systems (large language models (LLM), generative AI (GenAI)) become more advanced and user- friendly, criminal networks are increasingly leveraging their capabilities across a wide spectrum of crimes. GenAI models, for instance, have drastically reduced the barriers to entry for digital crimes. Criminals can now craft messages in multiple languages, target victims with precision on a global scale, create sophisticated malware, and even produce child sexual abuse material (CSAM).
By creating highly realistic synthetic media, criminals
are able to deceive victims, impersonate individuals and discredit or blackmail targets. The addition of AI-powered voice cloning and live video deepfakes amplifies the threat, enabling new forms of fraud, extortion, and identity theft. These tools are easily accessible and do not require specific technical skills.
Why it matters
The EU-SOCTA serves as Europol’s flagship threat assessment, offering in-depth insights into the future threats posed by serious and organised crime within the EU. Europol plays a pivotal role in providing national law enforcement agencies and partners with critical intelligence on emerging threats, enabling stakeholders to better anticipate and prepare for future challenges. This strengthens law enforcement’s ability to respond effectively to the evolving risks associated with organised crime.
Further reading
Europol (2025), European Union Serious and Organised Crime Threat Assessment – The changing DNA of serious and organised crime. Landing page. Published May 25, 2025. Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg.
Europol-EUIPO analysis: Uncovering the ecosystem of intellectual property crime. Article. October 16, 2024. by Steven Hawley. Piracy Monitor
