BRUSSELS (AP) – Belgian police made 48 arrests on Tuesday in an operation of unprecedented scale against organized crime, after investigators cracked an encrypted communications network popular with criminals, prosecutors said.
About 200 searches involving more than 1,500 police officers, including special forces, were carried out simultaneously across the country of 11.5 million people, the federal prosecutor said. Police seized 1.2 million euros ($ 1.4 million) in cash, in addition to firearms, jewelry, diamonds, police uniforms and luxury cars.
Meanwhile, Dutch police and prosecutors said in a statement that they arrested 30 suspects across the country and searched 75 homes and offices on Tuesday.
Belgian prosecutors said investigators cracked the encrypted messaging service Sky ECC and intercepted a billion messages during their two-year investigation that also contributed to the seizure of more than 17 tons of cocaine.
According to the survey, approximately 171,000 phones worldwide are equipped with the Sky ECC service.
The house searches started around 5 am and mainly took place in the Antwerp region. There were no major incidents, police said, adding that the operation dismantled several international organizations specializing in drug trafficking.
With thousands of sea containers reaching Antwerp every day, the Belgian port city is one of Europe’s main ports of entry for cocaine. Trade in the city has recently sparked a wave of violence, with gunfights and grenade attacks.
Last year, authorities in Belgium and three other countries dismantled a drug trafficking network that shipped hundreds of millions of dollars worth of cocaine to Western Europe. The investigation, which started when a container with 2.8 tons of cocaine was found in Antwerp, revealed an international network with connections in at least four European countries and South America.
Dutch police and prosecutors have seized 28 firearms in the port city of Rotterdam. Earlier in the investigation, they intercepted thousands of pounds (pounds) of cocaine, heroin and hashish, prosecutors said.
Law enforcement officials “have managed to access hundreds of millions of messages” from users of the encrypted messaging service Sky ECC, the Dutch prosecutors said.
The Sky ECC server was taken offline on Tuesday and seized by the Dutch authorities, the prosecution said.
Prosecutors said they were able to prevent dozens of planned crimes, including kidnappings and murders, while checking the encrypted messages.
The operation followed a similar crackdown last July, when European police cracked another encrypted communications network called EncroChat, allowing them to track criminals in real time as they planned drug shipments, arms trafficking and assassinations.
Prosecutors said on Tuesday that many former EncroChat users migrated to Sky ECC last year.
Corder reported from The Hague, the Netherlands.