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Migration and Home Affairs
  • 14 November 2025

Migrant smuggling

Migrant smuggling is a profitable business for criminal networks with an estimated annual turnover of over EUR 5 billion. Smugglers use land, sea and air routes to facilitate irregular migration both into and within the EU. They are also increasingly using digital technologies and platforms to facilitate their criminal activities.

Migrant smuggling is becoming more and more associated with serious human rights violations and deaths, in particular when it occurs by sea. The loss of migrants' lives at the hands of smugglers, in particular in the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, stresses the acute need to tackle migrant smuggling, using all of the legal, operational, and administrative tools available.

The fact that migrant smuggling networks are often closely linked to other forms of serious and organised crime, including terrorism, trafficking in human beings, drugs and money laundering increases this urgency.

A Global Alliance to counter migrant smuggling

On 28 November 2023, the Commission launched the Global Alliance to Counter Migrant Smuggling at an International Conference with EU Member States, non-EU countries and international organisations. This initiative marked the start of a new era of international cooperation to tackle migrant smuggling more effectively. A Call to Action presented at the conference outlines a comprehensive approach to confront this global challenge through coordinated action and determined international cooperation.   

All relevant actors, governments, international organisations and online service providers are called to work collectively on the three strands of the Global Alliance: 

  • preventing migrant smuggling
  • responding to migrant smuggling
  • promoting alternatives to irregular migration, including by addressing the root causes and facilitating legal pathways  

The Commission's second International Conference on the Global Alliance to Counter Migrant Smuggling is set to take place in In December 2025, building momentum to advance a long-term operational cooperation framework.

Prevention of migrant smuggling

Aside from emphasising the need to reinforce national legal frameworks and capacities to counter migrant smuggling, the Call to Action urged all members of the Alliance to increase prevention efforts, through information and awareness-raising campaigns on the risks of irregular migration and smuggling in countries of origin and transit.

The main objective of these campaigns is to deter irregular migration and combat migrant smuggling by providing reliable information on the dangers associated with them, as well as available legal migration pathways to Europe and alternative economic opportunities in origin and transit countries. This enables migrants and potential migrants to make better-informed decisions, based on objective information rather than misinformation spread by smugglers. 

Since 2014, the European Commission has been financing information and awareness-raising activities through the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF), reaching migrants along the main migratory routes. Seven of these projects were implemented between 2023-2025.

In November 2024, a EUR 10 million call for proposals was launched to prevent irregular migration, through awareness raising and information campaigns on the risks of irregular migration in selected third countries and within Europe. It builds on lessons learnt from previous campaigns and incorporates findings from the 2021 study on best practices in irregular migration awareness campaigns.

Since 2017, the Commission has also been funding InfoMigrants, an online media project with large-scale outreach run by three European media outlets. It aims at providing reliable and balanced information on migration in six languages for migrants in countries of origin, in transit, or already in Europe, offering an alternative to misleading and exploitative narratives used by smugglers.

The EMN Information and Awareness Raising Campaigns Working Group (EMN INFO WG) serves as a coordination platform, where the Commission and EU Member States exchange best practices and knowledge on information campaigns, while strengthening cooperation on migrant smuggling prevention. The Group brings together different actors involved in information campaigns to share knowledge, identify synergies, and explore opportunities for joint initiatives. 

The prevention of the use of commercial transport by smugglers, in particular air transport, is an EU priority. Cooperation is needed to curb this phenomenon and avoid that business operators (airlines, airports, etc.) and legitimate schemes (visa free travel, study, etc.) are abused for illicit purposes and suffer reputational risks. In 2023, the Commission adopted a Toolbox that proposes various actions to strengthen situational awareness and exchange of information, inside the EU between Member States and EU Agencies, and with international partners, including industry stakeholders, national authorities, and international organisations.   

In September 2025, the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) Assembly endorsed actions that could be considered for future ICAO guidelines and standards. These would help combat the growing use of commercial means of air transport to facilitate irregular migration to the EU. 

Response to migrant smuggling

In November 2023, the European Commission presented a set of legislative proposals to update the legal and operational framework against migrant smuggling. Negotiations between the Council and the European Parliament  are progressing:   

In September 2025, in her State of the Union address, President von der Leyen announced new plans to destroy the business model of smugglers, stressing the need for “a new system of sanctions specifically targeted at people smugglers and traffickers. To freeze their assets. To restrict their ability to move around. To cut off their profits”. 

To better manage migration in cooperation with partner countries, the EU has also been developing dedicated  “common operational partnerships”  against migrant smuggling with one or more EU Member States working alongside law enforcement, judiciary and other relevant authorities of a partner country, in cooperation with EU agencies and international organisations. Support may comprise of training, mentoring, exchange of information or provision of equipment. 

Another key area where all stakeholders need to cooperate is in preventing and combating the use of digital platforms and tools facilitating migrant smuggling. Today almost all forms of serious and organised crime have a digital footprint. Criminal networks use online platforms and applications for recruiting potential migrants, communicating, organising journeys and transferring money. Their advertising strategies are increasingly professional, showcasing successful journeys to the EU across multiple social media platforms to promote migrant smuggling services on social media.  

To tackle migrant smuggling in the digital domain, the Commission has launched together with Europol the DigiNex initiative, creating a community of experts focusing on the investigation of the online dimension of migrant smuggling. This network primarily focuses on open source investigations activities, raising awareness on the phenomenon at law enforcement and judiciary levels, promoting tools to more effectively identify illicit online content, strengthening international cooperation and improving intelligence sharing among EU Member States and partners. 

The Commission has improved the cooperation with key industry stakeholders, expanding the scope of the European Union Internet Forum to cover the online dimension of migrant smuggling. In this framework, the Commission facilitates a dialogue with the online platforms and internet service providers, as well as the sharing of good practices, to ensure the timely identification of migrant smuggling content.  

By targeting the digital networks that smugglers use, the Commission seeks to facilitate the disruption of these operations and more effectively dismantle the criminal infrastructure behind migrant smuggling, while enhancing the overall security of borders and migration systems within the EU. 

Alternatives to irregular migration

The Commission’s efforts on fostering alternatives to irregular migration include:  

  • promoting legal migration pathways and facilitating legal migration opportunities, including through programmes offering training opportunities
  • addressing the root causes of irregular migration, through strategic partnerships with countries of origin, such as Talent Partnerships. As part of the Pact on Migration and Asylum, these Partnerships enhance legal pathways to the EU, while engaging partner countries strategically on migration management. Their aim is to provide a framework as well as funding to boost mutually beneficial international mobility, better matching labour market needs in the EU and skills in partner countries. They are open to students, graduates and skilled workers. 
  • working on the effective return of smuggled migrants who do not have the right to stay in the EU, as well as their readmission and sustainable reintegration in the country of origin.

Working with partners at international level

The external dimension of the Pact on Migration and Asylum is one of its key elements. It underlines the importance of developing comprehensive, balanced, tailor-made and mutually beneficial migration partnerships with key countries of origin and transit, aiming at: 

  • improving migration governance and management
  • supporting refugees and host communities in partner countries
  • building economic opportunities
  • promoting dignified work and addressing the root causes of irregular migration
  • stepping up cooperation on return, readmission and reintegration
  • developing legal pathways
  • attracting skills and talent to Europe 

Anti-Smuggling Operational Partnerships have been launched with Morocco, Niger, Western Balkans and Tunisia. They provide for a more coordinated and structured approach towards operational cooperation with partner countries to combat migrant smuggling, involving EU Member States, EU agencies in line with their mandates and EU funding (Neighbourhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument – Global Europe, Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance III, Internal Security Fund, Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund, Border Management and Visa Instrument, as well as other relevant envelopes, taking into account partner’s national strategies and ensuring their ownership). They aim at reinforcing operational and strategic frameworks in partner countries and increasing the impact, ownership and sustainability of efforts to tackle migrant smuggling. 

Talent Partnerships to support legal migration and mobility have been signed with Tunisia, Morocco, Egypt, Pakistan, Bangladesh.    

In 2024 the EU signed with Mauritania a Joint Declaration launching an EU-Mauritania migration partnership a joint declaration covering various aspects of migration management, and a Strategic and Comprehensive Partnership with Egypt, including migration and mobility. 

The Commission has also accelerated work, together with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), to launch concrete actions and activities to support the Global Alliance on a global scale.

The UNODC, the lead United Nations entity working to prevent and combat migrant smuggling, is an important EU partner in the implementation of the Global Alliance to Counter Migrant Smuggling. This includes EU-funded actions, as well as the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime (UNTOC). The UNODC is also a crucial partner in upholding UNTOC standards on migrant smuggling and supporting technical assistance and capacity building in non-EU countries.

Over 30 events have been organised in various countries and as part of regional cooperation processes with UNODC. These events launched concrete projects to discuss tangible ways to enhance international cooperation in the fight against migrant smuggling, bringing together international partner countries of transit and origin, EU agencies and organisations.

Overall, more than EUR 200 million have been invested in different ongoing counter-smuggling projects. These projects cover some 25 partner countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, as well as Latin America and the Caribbean. A new joint action with the UNODC is under development in the area of countering illicit financial flows and cyber-enabled migrant smuggling.

EU Agencies support

Europol 

Europol, the European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation, plays a key role in supporting Member States' operational cooperation through the secure exchange of information, expertise and analytical support. 

Its European Migrant Smuggling Centre supports Member States' investigations into migrant smuggling networks, including financial investigations, and facilitates cooperation and coordination among law enforcement agencies. 

Europol's Internet Referral Unit contributes to the fight against migrant smuggling by supporting investigations in the digital domain. It also helps prevent migrant smuggling by selectively monitoring online content and referring detected content linked to migrant smuggling criminal networks to the relevant online platforms for removal. 

Frontex

EU presence at the external borders is ensured also by Frontex, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, which: 

  • patrols the EU's external border
  • collects data and intelligence regarding smuggling routes and practices of criminal networks 
  • provides support through satellite imagery in cooperation with other EU Agencies
  • provides support through operations in non-EU countries

Other EU agencies 

Other EU agencies also support the EU's action against migrant smuggling: 

  • European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Training (CEPOL) 
  • European Union Agency for Criminal Justice Cooperation (Eurojust) 

EMPACT

Operational cooperation between law enforcement agencies of EU Member States, relevant EU Agencies, and partner countries is crucial for clamping down on migrant smuggling. EMPACT, the European Multidisciplinary Platform Against Criminal Threats, is a security initiative driven by EU Member States to identify, prioritise and address threats posed by organised and serious international crime. Based on the 2025 European Union Serious and Organised Crime Threat Assessment (SOCTA) the priorities for the forthcoming EMPACT cycle (2026-2029) include the fight against criminal networks involved in migrant smuggling.  

Under the Operational Action Plan (OAP) on migrant smuggling, operational actions target each migratory route and focus on specific criminal phenomena linked to migrant smuggling, such as digital smuggling, sea and land smuggling, marriages of convenience and document fraud.  

Immigration Liaison Officer Network 

To reinforce the fight against migrant smuggling the EU created the European network of immigration liaison officers (ILO network) to better coordinate officers deployed in third countries by the European Commission, EU agencies and EU countries. As part of the ILO Network, these officers focus on: 

  • gathering and sharing information for its use at a strategic or operational level on all migration policy aspects
  • rendering assistance to return and readmission related tasks
  • providing targeted capacity-building activities to authorities

The liaison officers of the EU agencies and the Commission’s European Migration Liaison Officers (EMLOs) ease cooperation between various international actors, as well as local and national authorities and facilitate the cooperation of the ILOs at local and regional levels. 

Documents

Published studies: