The Dutch police introduced on Friday that they dismantled the Exclu encrypted communications platform after hacking into the service to watch the actions of prison organizations.

The operation consisted of two separate investigations beginning in September 2020 and April 2022, when the police additionally carried out 79 focused searches within the Netherlands, Germany, and Belgium and arrested 42 folks.

Eurojust, Europol, and the police forces in Italy, Sweden, France, and Germany assisted within the regulation enforcement operations.

Two of the arrested people are allegedly the house owners and managers of the encrypted telecommunications platform. The remaining 40 had been customers of the Exclu service, together with drug lab operators holding important quantities of narcotics, firearms, and over 4 million euros in money.

Within the Netherlands alone, the police searched 22 places and arrested 11 people believed to be linked with the Exclu platform.

The Dutch police say it has used its experience in know-how and cybercrime to hack into the Exclu service, establish its customers, and ultimately dismantle its infrastructure.

Exclu was promoting six-month person subscriptions for €800, permitting customers to trade encrypted messages and media (voice recordings, movies, photos). The police point out that the app had roughly 3,000 customers, 750 based mostly within the Netherlands.

The authorities now possess all communication knowledge, which they’re utilizing to proceed their investigations. This may increasingly result in discovering extra criminality and supply proof to help fees introduced in opposition to suspects.

Nonetheless, a phase of Exclu’s person base consists of execs in delicate fields, reminiscent of attorneys, investigators, notaries, and medical doctors, for whom privateness is important. These people are inspired to contact the police and request the removing of their knowledge from the seized servers.

Some folks use these obscure communication platforms as a substitute of standard end-to-end encrypted merchandise like Sign as a result of they promise excessive confidentiality and a number of layers of encryption and safety.

Additionally, lesser-known crypto-phone companies like Exclu are much less prone to be detected and focused by regulation enforcement authorities, permitting their existence to stay a secret from most of the people for years.

A notable case of the same crypto-phone platform takedown was that of EncroChat in July 2022, when a number of European police forces collaborated to dismantle the service and use seized knowledge to establish criminals.

EncroChat counted over 60,000 customers worldwide and offered subscriptions for €1,500 per six months whereas offering 24/7 buyer help.

The FBI and the Australian Federal Police additionally created a faux end-to-end encrypted chat platform named ANOM, permitting regulation enforcement to watch the actions of prison teams. This in the end led to the arrest of 800 folks.