More than 8,000 social media accounts linked to people smuggling taken down

More than 8,000 social media accounts linked to people smuggling were taken down following referrals from the National Crime Agency (NCA) last year, the law enforcement body said.

This was a 40 per cent increase from the 5,600 accounts removed in 2023, and means more than 16,500 have been taken down since the NCA launched its social media action plan with Meta, X, TikTok and YouTube in December 2021.

The accounts taken down in the course of the operation included posts that falsely promoted small boat crossings from France to the UK as being via speedboat and offered prizes to migrants who referred a friend, as well as fake ID documents for sale. Others also offered transport from Africa to southern Europe.

Sophie Austin, operations manager at the NCA’s Online Communication Centre, said: “Social media remains a key way the organised crime groups involved in people smuggling promoting their illegal services to migrants."

“It is a major part of their business model. Once migrants are engaged they then move conversations on to encrypted messaging apps where they are hidden from law enforcement," Ms Austin said. "Taking down these accounts disrupts the activities of those criminal networks, we are devoting more resources to doing that as it is one of a number of ways we can actively target them and make their life more difficult.”

Amanj Hasan Zada, from Preston, was convicted and jailed for 17 years in November after it was found he used video testimonials of those he had successfully smuggled to promote himself. Two other men, Dilshad Shamo and Ali Khdir from Caerphilly, South Wales, also used social media apps to publicise their people smuggling enterprise. They were convicted in November last year and are awaiting sentence.

Ms Austin added: “We continue to work closely with social media platforms to highlight such content and contribute to the development of detection capabilities. As a result, our partnership with them has seen a significant increase in the number of accounts we have identified and taken down in the last year – up more than 40 per cent since the end of 2023.”

The NCA first launched its operation with the four social media platforms in December 2021 “to help build understanding of how organised criminals used their platforms to advertise illegal services and limit gangs’ ability to exploit victims and plan dangerous illegal crossings,” the body said.