Cargo crime not necessarily stopped by the pandemic
The Transported Asset Protection Association (Tapa) took stock of the thievish activities concerning cargo during H1/2020. While cargo thieves in Europe, the Middle East & Africa (EMEA) were mostly curtailed by the Covid--19 lockdowns across the region, organised crime groups (OCGs) still identified ways to steal products, including high value shipments of personal protective equipment (PPE).
Data shared by law enforcement agencies with Tapa’s incident information service (IIS) for the first six months of the year was also interrupted, as police agencies diverted resources to support national lockdown protocols.
Yet, even with limited intelligence at hand, Tapa’s IIS database has so far recorded for the first 182 days of 2020, 3,278 cargo theft incidents with a total loss of more than EUR 85 million. Over EUR 52 million of this total was attributed to the 96 major incidents. (sh)