Italian mafia and its interest in Latin America, according to research

The italian mafia is less violent, with interest in tecnologic world and focused on expanding throughout Europe and Latin America, as described in the latest semi-annual report from the Anti-Mafia Investigation Directorate (DIA), which highlights the changing context of the organized crime.

The Italian authority highlights that the mafia clans continue a “incessant process of adaptation” to new contexts, with increasingly advanced investment strategies and even taking advantage of public resources such as European funds.

“Italian organized crime has been able to take advantage of the advantages offered by globalization, with flexible organizational structures that allow international exchanges and investments and have confirmed its position as a protagonist in the global criminal panorama,” is indicated in the report on the last half of 2022.

In this global scenario, the anti-mafia authority focuses on the interest that criminal groups have in expanding in Latin American countries, specifically mentioning Mexico, Colombia, Brazil, Peru, Argentina, and Ecuador.

“The large countries of Latin America have long been among the areas of greatest interest for the Italian mafias, by virtue of their contacts with the local cartels of the drug trafficking”, underlines.

The ports of Mexico and Colombia concentrate international cocaine trafficking, an activity that fuels the economic income of organized groups, especially the ‘Ndrangheta, the powerful Calabrian mafia, and which has expanded its base of operations to African countries such as Ghana, Guinea-Bissau and Ivory Coast.

Likewise, the report highlights that recent anti-drug raids have also identified infiltrations by the Italian mafia in the United States and Canada, as well as European countries such as Spain, France and the United Kingdom.

This “delocalization” of its activity has contributed to its sophisticated use of the latest encryption, messaging and even “advertising in illegal markets and disinformation on the internet for profit.”

Along with the activities “traditional”such as drug trafficking, prostitution or clandestine work, the investigation warns that “There are increasingly widespread illicit zones that cause less alarm and social disapproval, but that generate enormous benefits by compromising the normal dynamics of the market.”

An example is the mafia’s interest in the metaverse, a technological business in the development phase, cryptocurrencies and NFT virtual objects.

Thus, the DIA emphasizes that it is necessary “increase penetration capabilities in general in the network and in other less known sectors of the digital world, because the mafias are capable of continually regenerating themselves and have the highest technologies and technicians at their disposal.”

Among the criminal groups that the Italian mafia counts as preferred, the Albanian, Nigerian, Romanian and South American organizations stand out, as well as clans of Chinese origin infiltrated in Italy.

Source: EFE