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Europol's 2025 Serious and Organised Crime Threat Assessment (EU-SOCTA) reports that organized crime networks are increasingly adopting AI to scale and automate illegal activities. The report highlights the use of AI for cyber fraud, social engineering, voice cloning, and the generation of child sexual abuse material. Europol warns that these technologies make criminal operations more efficient and harder to detect, and notes that the agency has already conducted operations against groups distributing AI-generated child abuse imagery.
Europol’s EU Serious and Organised Crime Threat Assessment (EU-SOCTA) 2025 warns that AI is accelerating the growth of organized crime throughout Europe. Criminal networks are leveraging AI for cyber fraud, ransomware, money laundering, and child exploitation, while AI-powered social engineering and automation are making criminal operations more scalable and harder to detect.
The incident involves organized crime groups using AI to execute targeted fraud, scams, voice-cloning impersonation, blackmail, and the generation of child sexual abuse material for personal and financial gain.
The risk is driven by human criminals intentionally deploying and utilizing post-deployment AI systems to scale and automate illicit activities.
Risk Level 3: Limited Risk. The report highlights the widespread use of generative AI to create synthetic media, stating that 'by creating highly realistic synthetic media, criminals are able to deceive victims, impersonate individuals and discredit or blackmail targets,' which aligns with the definition of AI-generated content such as deepfakes.
Severity ratings are based on this scale.
Highest direct severity in any category: Substantial. Severity is scored from Negligible to Catastrophic in each harm category, for harm the reports describe as caused directly or indirectly by the AI system.
Reported: Yes, the report describes cyberattacks targeting critical infrastructure, specifically a Polish hospital.
Directly caused: An AI-boosted cyberattack targeted a Polish hospital, forcing it to stop its activities for several hours.
Inferred additional harm: AI-driven ransomware attacks on critical infrastructure likely cause temporary operational disruptions to utilities, healthcare, and government services across Europe.
Reported: Yes, the report explicitly describes the generation and distribution of AI-generated child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and highly realistic deepfakes used for blackmail.
Directly caused: Generative AI was used to produce synthetic child sexual abuse images, leading to the arrest of 24 individuals distributing this material.
Inferred additional harm: It is highly likely that vast amounts of AI-generated CSAM and deepfake extortion media are circulating globally across encrypted platforms, exposing many more individuals to harm.
Reported: Yes, the report describes the exploitation of children through AI-generated CSAM and the violation of individual rights through blackmail and identity theft.
Directly caused: The production of AI-generated child sexual abuse material directly violates the fundamental rights and safety of children.
Inferred additional harm: The scaling of AI-driven surveillance, identity theft, and extortion likely violates the privacy and civil rights of thousands of citizens globally.
Reported: Yes, the report notes that organized crime and state-sponsored hybrid warfare are destabilizing democratic political systems and institutions.
Indirectly caused: The collaboration between criminal networks and hostile state actors (like Russia and Belarus) using AI-driven cyberattacks and hybrid threats undermines the stability of EU democratic institutions and public trust.
Inferred additional harm: Continued AI-powered disinformation and cyber operations by state-aligned actors could further erode trust in democratic processes and public institutions across Europe.
Reported: Yes, the report mentions identity theft, blackmail, and online fraud schemes driven by access to stolen personal information.
Indirectly caused: AI-driven social engineering exploits stolen personal information to target individuals for fraud and extortion.
Inferred additional harm: The use of AI to analyze and exploit vast amounts of leaked or stolen personal data likely results in widespread, unquantified privacy violations for individuals targeted by cybercriminals.
Reported: Yes, the report mentions blackmail, extortion, and child sexual exploitation, which inherently cause severe psychological harm.
Indirectly caused: The distribution of AI-generated child sexual abuse material and targeted blackmail/extortion schemes cause severe psychological trauma and distress to victims.
Inferred additional harm: It is highly likely that thousands of victims of AI-driven blackmail, identity theft, and CSAM suffer severe, unquantified psychological trauma and anxiety.
Reported: Yes, the report describes the creation of highly realistic synthetic media, deepfakes, and voice cloning used to deceive victims.
Directly caused: Criminals use AI-powered voice cloning and live video deepfakes to impersonate individuals and deceive targets in cyberfraud operations.
Inferred additional harm: The widespread availability of highly realistic deepfakes and synthetic media threatens to erode public trust in digital communications and shared reality.
Reported: Yes, the report explicitly describes the use of generative AI to produce child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and the arrest of 24 people for distributing it.
Directly caused: Generative AI was used to produce synthetic child sexual abuse images, which were then distributed online.
Inferred additional harm: The ease of generating CSAM using AI tools likely facilitates a significant, unquantified increase in the creation and circulation of child exploitation material globally.
Europol's assessment highlights a substantial national security threat as organized crime networks integrate AI tools to scale cyber fraud, generate child abuse material, and attack critical infrastructure. The convergence of criminal activities with state-sponsored hybrid warfare presents a notable challenge to European and global security.