Within the National Directorate of Customs Intelligence and Investigations (DNRED), Cyberdouane tracks down criminal groups mainly on the Internet. Its director (whose anonymity we have respected for security reasons) explains to the World how he and his team pursue an organized crime with increasingly sophisticated activities: drug trafficking, tobacco, shisha tobacco, counterfeiting but also arms trafficking.
What are Cybercustoms means of action?
Our prerogatives, subject to the customs code, are gaining momentum. With authorization from the public prosecutor’s office, our agents can carry out a “blow buy”, allowing us to pretend to be customers, and thus buy weapons, but also narcotics or counterfeit items such as tobacco. This allows us to go back to the source of traffic: sellers and marketplaces. Since 2016, we have been able to carry out surveys under pseudonyms, allowing us to collect information on the sales channels of prohibited products, and to get closer to the real identity of the sellers.
This article is taken from “Special Edition Le Monde: Mafias, how organized crime threatens the world” 2022. This special issue is on sale in kiosks or on the Internet by visiting the website of our shop.
What are your main missions?
First, detect Internet fraud, then detect profiles. We particularly target those who seem to us the most important, who post ads on a regular basis. Then our job is to break the anonymity on the Internet, to break the immunity. Let those who think they are untouchable understand that this is not the case. Sometimes it’s very easy, when they give their mobile phone number – for example, for people reselling counterfeit perfumes made in China. These people can earn up to 50,000 euros a year in this way: it is very real traffic, but not necessarily the most dangerous public. On the other hand, when it comes to more organized networks, they know that it is illegal and protect themselves more, even for the traffic of tobacco and shisha tobacco, which occupies a great place at the moment.
“In a very recent file, 400 kilos of shisha tobacco had been sold on social networks, in particular on Facebook and Snapchat”
What means do these traffickers have to operate discreetly?
The use of VPN [réseaux virtuels privés], the dark Net, prepaid telephones, but also false identity documents… The law is evolving more slowly than the Internet, and this is a major issue. For example, with regard to the seizure of cryptocurrencies. The law must continue to evolve so that we can create what are called “honey jars”, making it possible to impersonate sellers. This solution exists in the United States and has very good results. We, in France, are not yet inciting.
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