Manhunt for the syndicate has led to nearly 80 arrests in recent months.
Ireland’s Garda National Economic Crime Bureau (GNECB, a.k.a. Garda), the country’s version of Nigeria’s EFCC has said Nigerian fraudsters are behind an international scam syndicate that has stolen more than €15.5 million from Europe and beyond.
Since the launch of Garda’s Operation Skein—an investigation into worldwide invoice-redirect fraud and the subsequent laundering of the proceeds through bank accounts in Ireland—at least 78 people have been arrested, including Nigerians, Ghanaians, Italians, Romanians, etc.
Five people in their late teens and early 20s were yesterday arrested in Irish county Co Longford: four men and one woman after a Garda raid there. The suspects, still in custody, are accused of recruiting money mules and laundering money for a criminal organization.
Gardaí believe the scam is led by Nigerian criminals, based in Ireland and abroad. Invoice-redirect fraud, also known as BEC schemes, involves crime gangs tricking companies into lodging money into accounts controlled by the criminals. They send invoices to companies purporting to come from one of the targeted companies’ trading partners.
Fraudsters gain control of accounts by opening them under false identities or paying the account holder for access to their account for the purposes of receiving and transferring money.
Of the 78 arrests, some have been convicted while others remain before the courts charged with offences.
The authorities have sworn pursuit of the criminals, working with local districts and international police forces through Eurojust, Europol, and Interpol.
