Today, we stand close to the many thousands victims ofterrorism and their families all around the world, includingthose of the recent Vienna attacks, our host country andhome to many of us within the team. We stand by thosemany victims "struggling in their solitude with the scars oftrauma and injury" as "their human rights and dignity havebeen violated with indiscriminate violence. Only theacknowledgment of their suffering can start their healing;only information-sharing can overcome their isolation; onlyspecialized rehabilitation and redress can help them rebuildtheir lives" (Laura Dolci, victim of the Canal Hotel bombingin Iraq of 2003).

Today, our prayers and thoughts go to all the victims andsurvivors of terrorism around the world. We reaffirm ourstrong commitment to facilitate information-sharing as ameans to build knowledge and expertise to counter crime, inall its forms and manifestations, including terrorism.

The SHERLOC team

FEATURED CASE:ELYSIUM PLATFORM

The SHERLOC Team is pleased to share with you Issue No. 16 of our newsletterregarding our recent efforts to facilitate the dissemination of information regardingthe implementation of the UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crimeand the Protocols thereto, and the international legal framework against terrorism.

In this issue

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MEET A CONTRIBUTOR

RECENT ACTIVITIES

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EDITORIAL: CYBERCRIME

AND ORGANIZED CRIME Information and communication technology(ICT) has changed conceptions of organizedcrime: it has impacted both the nature oforganized crime activities as well as the types ofindividuals who can participate in organizedcrime. For instance, some traditional organizedcriminal groups are gradually moving fromtraditional criminal activities to cybercrime,shifting certain activities and operations online.

In addition, ICT has also transformed theway in which certain groups are structured andorganized, as “new” groups and/or networksoperating online have been formed. These groupsoften have similar behaviours to traditionalorganized criminal groups – particularly their useof organizational structures and specialprocedures which are designed to preserve theanonymity of their members and evade detectionby law enforcement agencies.

Moreover, this technology removes the needfor face-to-face contact between individuals andenables individuals who have never met before towork closely together and coordinate theiractivities from anywhere in the world.

Cyberspace provides organized criminalgroups with a space within which they canconduct their illicit activities with a degree ofanonymity, exploit the gaps in the legal systemsaround the world, conduct operations, and accessclients anywhere in the world. Hence, theproblem of transnational organized crime isfurther compounded by ever-increasing globalconnectivity and the borderless realm ofcyberspace.

This issue of the SHERLOC Newsletterfocusses on the topic of cybercrime andorganized crime. It includes a feature of theGerman case which concerned ‘Elysium’, anonline platform for child sexual abuse material onthe dark web. Also included in this issue isinformation on the recent Conference of theParties to the UN Convention againstTransnational Organized Crime and theSHERLOC team’s recent activities in the field ofcyber organized crime as well as our regular ‘Meeta Contributor’ feature.

Take care, stay safe and healthy,the SHERLOC team

FEATURED CASE: ELYSIUM The Elysium platform, accessible via thedarknet, has been host to a number of differentforums and was used by over 110, 000 users toexchange child abuse material, to chat and tocoordinate the sexual abuse of children.

The platform was run from Germany andsupplied photographs and videos of child abusearound the world. It was finally taken down inJune 2017 by German police in the context of amajor European police operation supported byEuropol and its members. Investigators foundthat the platform was mainly run andadministered by 4 German males.

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Image: Reddit

From 21 to 24 September 2020, over 90experts from the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC)region and the broader region of the Middle Eastand North Africa, together with practitionersfrom North, Central and Latin America, Europeand Asia, gathered together to attend an informalexpert group meeting (EGM) on cyber organizedcrime.

The meeting, organised by UNODC's Office forthe Gulf Cooperation Council Region (OGCCR) incollaboration with the SHERLOC team and withthe financial support of the United Arab Emirates(UAE), was held online with the aim of facilitatingsharing of knowledge and expertise oninvestigating, prosecuting and adjudicating casesof cyber organized crime. The EGM featured thepresentation and analysis of cases and practicaldiscussions on challenges and good practices intackling those cases.

The outcomes of the meeting will be included ina forthcoming case digest on cyber organizedcrime and in SHERLOC's Case Law Database.

An Expert Group Meeting on CyberOrganized Crime

Case Digest on Cyber Organized Crime UNODC is developing a case digest on cyberorganized crime. The ultimate goal of this digest isto identify and assess the manner in which cyberorganized crime has been investigated,prosecuted, and adjudicated in different areas ofthe world. Should you wish to contributesubmitting relevant concluded cases for inclusioninto the case digest, please contact us at unodc-sherloc@un.org, including any relevant courtdocuments as attachments.

RECENT ACTIVITIES

In 2019, the Regional Court of Limburg,Germany, ruled that the defendants hadconstructed, operated and used one of the largestsites of child sexual abuse material worldwide andthat one of the defendants was found guilty ofsexual abuse of two children.

This case is particularly interesting as it wasthe first case in Germany against Germandefendants accused of using the darknet tooperate an online child sexual exploitationplatform. The Court considered the question ofwhether the defendants constituted an organizedcriminal group. While examining the roles of thedefendants and their tasks, the Court further heldthat the defendants as well as every singlemember registered on the forums or the chatrooms of the platform was to be seen as amember of an organized criminal group.

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This feature has been adapted from the originalSHERLOC case entry. To find out more about thiscase, click here to access it on SHERLOC.

Moreover, it highlighted that the fact that themembers of the organized criminal group did notknow each other personally and communicateover nicknames or pseudonyms was irrelevant totheir classification as an organized criminalgroup. The Court’s findings are significant to theprosecution of cyber criminals for organizedcrime offences.

the role of online intermediaries in preventingand countering organised crime;linkages of cyber and organised crime; andthe tools developed by UNODC to facilitate

The tenth session of the Conference of theParties (COP) to the United Nations Conventionagainst Transnational Organized Crime tookplace from 12 to 16 October 2020 in a hybridformat. Despite the ongoing COVID-19pandemic, the Conference registered highparticipation, thanks to the possibility toparticipate both in-person and virtually: over1,100 participants from more than 120 countries,16 inter-governmental organizations, 146 civilsociety representatives took part in the session,and 60 side events were held.

The COP concluded with the adoption of 7resolutions - a remarkable record for COP -including resolutions on the topics of traffickingin firearms, trafficking in persons, falsifiedmedical products, trafficking in cultural property,environmental crime. The SHERLOC team wasbusy servicing the informal consultations onthese resolutions. Moreover, two resolutionsfocussed specifically on the Convention, alsoknown as Palermo Convention, and aimed atlaunching the review mechanism of theConvention and celebrating its 20th anniversary,which will occur this year in December. For thisoccasion, don't miss our #UNTOC20 campaignand follow us on Twitter through both @UNODCand @UNODC_SHERLOC. The final adoptedtext of the resolutions will be made availableonline.

This year, all COP side events were held online,which allowed for a wider attendance fromaround the globe while also marking the largestnumber of side events organised during a COP.The SHERLOC team supported the organisationof three side events on:

international cooperation.

These side events provided an opportunity todiscuss substantive issues, such as the latest trendsand developments in organised crime as well asprevention of organized crime and responsesthereto.

They also provided an opportunity to illustratetools developed by UNODC to supportpractitioners in countering organised crime in allits forms and manifestations, such as SHERLOC,and allowed participants to exchange goodpractices and lessons learnt, as well as to shareexamples of how tools such as SHERLOC havecontributed been used in practice.

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The team still smiling behind the masks at the end of asuccessful week

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Ms. Ianina Lipara, the Coordinator of theEuropean Judicial Network Secretariat (EJN)mentioned during a side event, that in a recentcase from Germany, prosecutors needed tosend a mutual legal assistance request toPakistan, but had trouble locating some of therelevant legislation of Pakistan. Upon advicefrom the EJN Secretariat, they were able tofind the required legislation in SHERLOC andsuccessfully submit the request.

To find legislationconcerning mutual legalassistance, visit SHERLOC’slegislation database.

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Throughout the past months, the SHERLOCteam has provided presentations and briefings togovernment officials and practitioners fromaround the globe to showcase SHERLOC andexplain how it can be used in their day-to-daywork.

September 2020 – the SHERLOC teamcontributed to two Workshops on "TargetedFinancial Sanctions in Countering the Financingof Terrorism and SHERLOC", organised by theUNODC Country Office Pakistan, incollaboration with the National CounterTerrorism Authority (NACTA). The SHERLOCteam briefed the audiences of the two workshops- a group of Pakistani female anti-terrorismprosecutors and a group investigators from to theCounter Terrorism Department (CTD) of SindhPolice – on the use of SHERLOC as a tool forlegal information during investigation andprosecution of cases of terrorism and organizedcrime. An introduction to SHERLOC, andlinkages between organized crime and terrorism,was followed by practical demonstration of theportal for the participants. To learn more, clickhere.

Online briefing to female anti-terrorism prosecutors inPakistan

Technical Assistance activities andpresentations

October 2020 – the SHERLOC teamparticipated in the 7th Interpol Liaison Officers'Conference convened by India's Central Bureauof Investigation where the team introducedSHERLOC as a key tool for investigations to anaudience of 125 officials. Moreover, the briefingalso focussed on the linkages between cyberorganized crime and aimed at providing theaudience with information on other UNODCtools to facilitate international cooperation andmutual legal assistance.

MEET A CONTRIBUTOR This issue’s featured contributor is Adelaida.

Adelaida is a graduated political scientist andanthropologist specialized in human rights,criminology, criminalistics and forensic sciences,currently working as SHERLOC Focal point oncybercrime and anti-money laundering.Before joining UNODC, she participated in theinvestigation of human rights violations inNorthern Somalia by assisting in the collection ofante-mortem data, location of mass graves,exhumation and forensic identification of victims.Her experience in field operations also includesworking at UNHCR, where she assisted theactivities related to the processing of refugeeclaims in Cairo. She has also worked as a privatedetective in financial crime investigations inSpain and as a researcher in the areas of fraud,corruption, money laundering and terrorismfinancing in Austria.