Today, Europol unveils its latest report, Leveraging legitimacy: How the EU’s most threatening criminal networks abuse legal business structures, examining how criminal networks abuse legal business structures to strengthen their power and expand their criminal operations. This report builds upon Europol’s April 2024 study, Decoding the EU’s Most Threatening Criminal Networks, which identified the abuse of legal business structures as a central characteristic of these networks. At the request of the Justice and Home Affairs Council of the European Union, Europol conducted a detailed assessment to offer further insights into how, why, and where this abuse takes place.

A critical enabler of organised crime

The report identifies the abuse of legal businesses as a key enabler of organised crime. Legal business structures are integral to laundering criminal proceeds, distorting economic competition, transporting illicit goods and expanding the influence of criminal networks. Cash-intensive businesses, in particular, are exploited to shield money laundering activities, creating unfair advantages that undermine legitimate enterprises.

The findings also highlight how criminal networks use corruption to deepen their grip on local communities, fostering economic dependencies that shield illicit activities from law enforcement.

Key findings

• A common threat vector: 86% of the EU’s most threatening criminal networks exploit legal business structures. Criminals use these frameworks to disguise their activities, facilitate money laundering, and expand their operations while evading law enforcement.
• Criminal ownership and infiltration: High-level infiltration or outright ownership of legal businesses allows criminal networks to mix legitimate and illicit activities seamlessly. Some companies are established purely as fronts for criminal operations, while others are taken over to serve long-term criminal goals.
• Cross-border abuse: Although the abuse of legal business structures is a global phenomenon, most exploited or infiltrated companies used by EU-based criminal networks (70%) operate within the EU or its neighbouring countries. Nevertheless, there is a significant share of EU criminal networks that are involved in legal structures located in other places in the world. Criminally infiltrated legal business structures are situated in almost 80 countries across the globe.
• Insider threats: Employees, managers, or executives in legitimate positions are increasingly exploited by criminal networks to gain access, knowledge, and influence over operations.
• Facilitating multiple crimes: Criminally controlled businesses often serve several networks simultaneously, enabling various forms of serious and organised crime.

The findings will inform future operational activities, but will also serve as input to discussions on administrative and preventive measures.