Europol warns of AI-driven crime threats

(Reuters) - Organised crime gangs are turning to AI-powered scams and payment systems to target victims, allowing them to rapidly and more cheaply scale up operations globally and making them harder to detect, Europol warned on Tuesday.

The technology means they can craft messages in multiple languages and create highly realistic dupes to impersonate individuals and blackmail targets in global cyberfraud operations, the law enforcement agency of the EU said in its European Serious Organised Crime Threat Assessment report.

Criminals are also using generative artificial intelligence to produce child sexual abuse material, it said.

"The very DNA of organised crime is changing. Criminal networks have evolved into global, technology-driven criminal enterprises, exploiting digital platforms, illicit financial flows, and geopolitical instability to expand their influence," Catherine De Bolle, Europol’s executive director, said.

The agency said elements of every criminal process were increasingly moving online, including recruitment, communication and payment systems.

"The same qualities that make AI revolutionary - accessibility, adaptability, and sophistication - also make it a powerful tool for criminal networks," Europol said.

"These technologies are automating and expanding criminal operations, making them more scalable and harder to detect."

The report warned that the emergence of fully autonomous AI, in which systems plan and execute tasks without human guidance, "could pave the way for entirely AI-controlled criminal networks, marking a new era in organised crime".

In late February, Europol announced the arrest of two dozen people for distributing AI-generated child abuse images.

The operation was one of the first involving AI-generated child abuse material, Europol said at the time, adding there was a lack of national legislation surrounding the use of AI tools for this purpose.

In early December, it said it had taken down an encrypted messaging service MATRIX that was used for international drug and arms trafficking.

Europol on Tuesday listed cyber attacks, migrant smuggling, drug and firearms trafficking and wrongdoing in waste management among the fastest growing criminal threats on the continent.

(Reporting by Michal Aleksandrowicz; Editing by Alison Williams)