An international investigation led by the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA) has disrupted Smart and TGR, two money laundering networks aiding organized crime across the globe. The operation, dubbed ‘Operation Destabilise’, has led to the arrest of 84 individuals and the seizure of over £20 million in cash and cryptocurrency.

The two networks provided financial services to criminal organizations, including the notorious Kinahan cartel, as well as Russian elites circumventing sanctions. Furthermore, Smart was found to have directly funded Russian espionage operations from late 2022 to mid-2023.

Smart and TGR operated a sophisticated money laundering system spanning over 30 countries. By using a “hawala-like” model, the networks collected funds in one location and provided equivalent sums elsewhere, often converting cash into cryptocurrency to obscure the money trail.

Smart, led by Ekaterina Zhdanova, and TGR, managed by George Rossi, Elena Chirkinyan, and Andrejs Bradens, handled transactions involving millions of pounds for transnational crime groups, including those trafficking drugs and firearms into the UK.

The investigation has resulted in sanctions against six ringleaders, with the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) targeting their operations and associated businesses. Among those sanctioned are Zhdanova, Rossi, and Chirkinyan.

The Smart and TGR services were also used to support Russian espionage and cybercrime activities. Investigators uncovered that Zhdanova laundered $2.3 million in ransomware payments for the Ryuk ransomware group, which extorted at least £27 million from UK victims, including hospitals and schools.

The networks also assisted sanctioned Russian entities in bypassing restrictions to access Western markets, including facilitating the purchase of UK properties and supporting Russian-language media organizations potentially linked to state propaganda.

In other news, a sophisticated criminal network involved in large-scale online fraud has been disrupted as part of a law enforcement operation led by Germany’s Hanover Police Department and Verden Public Prosecutor’s Office. The operation resulted in the seizure of over 50 servers and 200 terabytes of digital evidence. Two key suspects, aged 27 and 37, were arrested under European arrest warrants and are now in pretrial detention.

The investigation began in late 2022, focusing on fraudulent phone scams where perpetrators posed as bank employees to steal sensitive information. The data was traced to an online marketplace specializing in the sale of stolen personal details, sorted by region and account balance, enabling targeted fraud. The network also operated fake online shops to harvest payment credentials, later sold on the marketplace for profit.

The marketplace’s infrastructure and fake shops was dismantled on December 4 as part of coordinated actions in Germany, Austria, Finland, the Netherlands, and Norway.