Europol said Wednesday that it identified 69 piracy and illegal streaming sites during a November 10–14 cyber-patrol in Alicante, Spain, with the EU Intellectual Property Office and Spanish police, referring 25 illicit IPTV services to crypto providers for disruption and opening probes into 44 more. The targeted sites drew an estimated 11.8 million annual visitors.
Investigators traced about $55 million in cryptocurrency linked to the services and said criminals are increasingly shifting from traditional payment systems to crypto, wrongly believing it offers more anonymity. Europol said investigators countered this by using cryptocurrency to buy illegal services, helping them identify operators and report them to major exchanges and other partners.
The operation relied on Open-Source Intelligence Techniques (OSINT)—methods that pull clues from publicly available online data—to flag targets and develop leads. More than 15 countries and private-sector organizations joined the effort to bolster cooperation against online intellectual property crime.
