Hostile states are using organised crime gangs to carry out illegal activity in the UK, the head of the National Crime Agency (NCA) has warned.
Director-general Graeme Biggar highlighted “the emerging links between serious and organised crime and hostile states” in a speech outlining the agency’s annual assessment of crime threats to Britain.
Speaking in Westminster, he said: “North Korea has for some time used cybercrime to steal funds and more recently cryptocurrency.
“The Russian state has long tolerated and occasionally tasked the cybercrime groups on its territory, and had links with its oligarchs and their enablers.
“And over the last year we have seen hostile states beginning to use organised crime groups – not always of the same nationality – as proxies.
“It is a development we and our colleagues in MI5 and CT (counter-terrorism) policing are watching closely.”
Mr Biggar said the biggest group of offenders in the UK is those who pose a sexual threat to children – estimated to be between 680,000 to 830,000 people, or around 10 times the prison population.
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He said the availability of abuse images online has a radicalising effect by normalising paedophiles’ behaviour, and viewing images – whether real or AI-generated – increases the risk of someone going on to abuse a child themselves.
There are around 59,000 people involved in serious organised crime in the UK, with around £12bn generated by criminal activities each year and around £100bn of dirty cash from around the globe laundered through the UK.
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Key threats to UK:
• Criminals exploiting migrants travelling to the UK in small boats. Mr Biggar said gangs are using “bigger, flimsier, single-use boats” and packing more people on each craft.
• Illegal drug use that fuels a raft of other crimes, including violence, theft, use of guns and modern slavery. Nearly 120 tonnes of cocaine and 40 tonnes of heroin are consumed in the UK each year, and NCA analysis of wastewater suggests cocaine use is increasing by 25% in some areas. The agency wants to stop the use of synthetic opioids such as fentanyl from getting a hold here as they have in the US.
• Online fraud, which accounts for more than 40% of crime. Mr Biggar said 75% of fraud is partially or fully committed from overseas, with generative AI being used to make frauds more believable through the use of deep fake videos and Chat GPT to write more compelling phishing emails. He also said development in technology such as end-to-end encryption are making the agency’s job harder.
Mr Biggar said: “Law enforcement, including the NCA, needs to do more to be at the leading edge of new technology: this will require collective vision and sustained investment.
“And, secondly, we need more effective strategic partnership from technology companies.
“This is about responsible behaviour about designing public safety into their products alongside privacy, so that we all reap the benefits from technology, rather than suffering their consequences.”
The man who served 14 years in jail for the murder of schoolboy Jimmy Mizen has been recalled to prison for breaching his licence conditions.
It follows reporting in The Sun newspaper that Jake Fahri, 35, was a drill rapper releasing music under the name TEN, who conceals his identity with a balaclava, and was played on BBC 1Xtra.
A Probation Service spokesperson said: “Our thoughts are with Jimmy Mizen’s family who deserve better than to see their son’s murderer shamelessly boasting about his violent crime.”
Jimmy’s father Barry told Sky News: “We’re not gloating or anything, in a way it’s quite sad.”
His son bled to death after Fahri threw an oven dish at him in a south London bakery on 10 May 2008.
The dish shattered on his chin and severed an artery in the schoolboy’s neck.
Fahri was 19 when he was given a life sentence in 2009 with a minimum term of 14 years and was released on licence in June 2023.
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His music was played on BBC 1Xtra less than 18 months later, the Sun reported, adding that DJ Theo Johnson named him an “up-and-coming star”.
Jimmy’s father earlier said he and his wife Margaret were “stunned into silence” when they were told about Fahri’s music, which often features violent themes.
In one song, which appears to reference Jimmy’s death, he raps about “sharpening” a blade.
“Judge took a look at me, before the trial even started he already knows he’s gonna throw the book at me,” the lyrics say.
Another track includes the lines: “See a man’s soul fly from his eyes and his breath gone… I wanted more, it made it less wrong. Seeing blood spilled same floor he was left on.”
The BBC has said the artist’s tracks do not feature on any BBC playlists, and that a track which appeared to reference Jimmy’s death had never been played on its channels.
A spokesman for the broadcaster added there were “no further plans to play his music”, adding: “We were not aware of his background and we in no way condone his actions.”
A Probation Service spokesperson said: “All offenders released on licence are subject to strict conditions. As this case shows, we will recall them to prison if they break the rules.”
Jimmy’s parents founded the Mizen Foundation after their son’s death. The charity helps young people in London who are escaping violence.
Mr Mizen said: “It appears that if he’s been recalled to prison, he must’ve breached his licence conditions
The man suspected of abducting Madeleine McCann won’t face any charges in the foreseeable future, a prosecutor has told Sky News.
German drifter Christian B, who cannot be fully identified under his country’s privacy law, is expected to be freed from an unrelated jail sentence this year while police in three countries continue to search for evidence against him.
Prosecutor Hans Christian Wolters said: “There is currently no prospect of an indictment in the Maddie case.
“As things stand, the accused Christian B’s imprisonment will end in early September.”
Madeleine, aged three, was asleep with her younger twin siblings in the family’s Portuguese rented holiday apartment before mother Kate discovered her missing at around 10pm on 3 May, 2007.
Her parents were dining nearby on the complex with friends and taking turns to check on all their sleeping children every half an hour.
Madeleine’s disappearance has become the world’s most mysterious missing child case.
Philipp Marquort, one of Christian B’s defence lawyers, welcomed the prosecutor’s pessimism about bringing charges.
He said: “This confirms the suspicions that we have repeatedly expressed, namely that there is no reliable evidence against our client.
“We regret that we have not yet been granted access to the investigation files. We have not yet been able to effectively counter the public prejudice arising from statements made by the prosecutor’s office.”
Christian B, 47, is in jail and coming to the end of his sentence for the rape of an elderly American woman in Praia da Luz, the Portuguese resort where Madeleine disappeared.
In October, he was acquitted on a series of rape and indecent assault charges after a non-jury trial in Germany, in which several references were made to his status as the main suspect in the Madeleine case.
The prosecutor said he was awaiting the court’s written judgment before launching an appeal against the acquittal. He believes the trial judges were biased against the prosecution.
If successful, he could apply for a new arrest warrant for Christian B to keep him in custody until a retrial with new judges.
He said: “We hope that the Federal Court of Justice will decide before the end of the accused’s imprisonment. If the Federal Court follows our legal opinion, we could apply for a new arrest warrant for the accused’s offences, so that the accused would then remain in custody beyond September 2025.
Mr Marquort said the defence team would oppose the prosecution’s appeal against the acquittal.
Prosecutor Mr Wolters has said in the past that he believes Madeleine is dead and that Christian B was responsible for her death. The suspect denies any involvement.
The case against Christian B is purely circumstantial; he’s alleged to have confessed to a friend that he abducted Madeleine, he has convictions for sex crimes against children, he was living in the area at the time, his mobile phone was close by when the young girl vanished and he re-registered one of his vehicles the next day.
The prosecutor won’t say what evidence he has to convince him Madeleine is dead, but he admitted he is still trying to find forensic evidence to link Christian B to the girl.
Jim Gamble, former head of the UK Child Exploitation and Online Protection centre, said he had expected the prosecutor to charge Christian B soon.
“He’s implied the whole way through that he has something more than the public are aware of,” he said.
“He’s made fairly definitive statements about whether Madeleine is alive or dead so you would expect their strategy to have been to charge him sooner rather than later.
“From what he’s said today I wonder if we’re witnessing the re-positioning of something to manage the disappointment that’ll come.”
Mr Wolters, who is based in Braunschweig, Lower Saxony, is investigating the case with the help of Portuguese police and detectives from Scotland Yard.
An investigation, led by the Surrey and Sussex Police Major Crime Team, is under way and inquiries remain ongoing, police said.
Senior Investigating Officer DCI Kimball Edey said specialist officers “are working around the clock to gather as much information as possible,” and that the force’s “thoughts are with the family and friends of the victims at this unbelievably difficult time”.