Europol has published its Internet Organised Crime Threat Assessment 2021 (IOCTA), Europol’s flagship strategic product that provides a law enforcement-focused assessment of evolving threats and key developments in the area of cybercrime. In previous versions of the IOCTA, it has been highlighted that the persistent nature of various modi operandi meant that changes of cybercrime threats were rarer than commonly perceived. Last year’s IOCTA captured the landscape by reflecting on how cybercrime is an evolution rather than a revolution.

According to Europol’s press release, criminals would have been quick to abuse the circumstances related to the pandemic to increase profits, expanding their activities to various areas and exposing vulnerabilities, connected to systems, hospitals and/or individuals. While ransomware groups would have taken advantage of widespread teleworking, scammers would have abused Covid-19 fears to defraud victims or gain access to their bank accounts. Furthermore, the increase of online shopping in general would have attracted more fraudsters. Grey infrastructure, including services offering end-to-end encryption, VPNs and cryptocurrencies would continue to be abused for the facilitation and proliferation of a large range of criminal activities. All these circumstances would have resulted in significant challenges for the investigation of criminal activities and the protection of victims of crime.