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European law enforcement agencies conducted Operation SIMCARTEL , dismantling a network of SIM farms whose operators managed 1,200 SIM boxes with 40,000 SIM cards. These phone numbers were used for phishing, investment fraud, extortion, and other criminal activities.
The SIM farms reportedly facilitated more than 3,200 cases of fraud and caused at least €4.5 million in losses to victims.
According to Europol, the farm operators offered their services through two websites—gogetsms[.]com and apisim[.]com—which are now offline and display a message about the law enforcement operation.
The dismantling of the infrastructure was the result of a joint effort between Europol and specialists from the Shadowserver Foundation. Law enforcement agencies from Austria, Estonia, Finland, and Latvia also participated in the operation.
The fraudulent service offered phone numbers registered to individuals in more than 80 countries. The numbers were rented out to clients who needed to create and verify fake accounts, allowing them to conceal their true identity and location.
[td]"The criminal network and its infrastructure were technically sophisticated and allowed attackers around the world to exploit the service to commit a wide range of telecommunications cybercrimes and other illegal activities," law enforcement officials wrote.[/td]According to authorities, the service has been used to create over 49 million fraudulent accounts and has already been linked to 1,700 fraud cases in Austria and 1,500 in Latvia.
Crimes facilitated by the service include fraud, extortion, illegal immigration, marketplace scams, WhatsApp money transfer requests, investment fraud, fake stores and banking websites, and impersonating police officers. Five Latvian citizens and two additional suspects were reportedly arrested during Operation SIMCARTEL, and the following items were confiscated:
The SIM farms reportedly facilitated more than 3,200 cases of fraud and caused at least €4.5 million in losses to victims.
According to Europol, the farm operators offered their services through two websites—gogetsms[.]com and apisim[.]com—which are now offline and display a message about the law enforcement operation.
The dismantling of the infrastructure was the result of a joint effort between Europol and specialists from the Shadowserver Foundation. Law enforcement agencies from Austria, Estonia, Finland, and Latvia also participated in the operation.
The fraudulent service offered phone numbers registered to individuals in more than 80 countries. The numbers were rented out to clients who needed to create and verify fake accounts, allowing them to conceal their true identity and location.
Crimes facilitated by the service include fraud, extortion, illegal immigration, marketplace scams, WhatsApp money transfer requests, investment fraud, fake stores and banking websites, and impersonating police officers. Five Latvian citizens and two additional suspects were reportedly arrested during Operation SIMCARTEL, and the following items were confiscated:
- 1200 SIM boxes with 40,000 working SIM cards;
- hundreds of thousands of SIM cards;
- five servers and two websites;
- 431,000 euros (500,000 US dollars) in frozen bank accounts and 333,000 US dollars in crypto accounts;
- four luxury cars.