The head of Europol has warned that 5G networks could result in the police being unable to track suspects’ mobile devices.

In an interview with Reuters, Catherine De Bolle appealed to EU leaders for greater powers to fight tech-savvy criminals, pointing out that member states do not yet have the domestic regulations or technology to fill the gap that will open when 4G networks become obsolete.

“It is one of the most important investigative tools that police officers and services have, so we need this in the future,” she said, citing the example of locating a child who has been kidnapped or has disappeared.

European police authorities are currently able to listen to and track wanted criminals using mobile communication devices on the 4G network, but “we cannot use them in the 5G network,” De Bolle stated, adding that law enforcement agencies were brought into talks on the 5G transition among tech companies and policymakers too late.

“The biggest risk is that we are not enough aware of the developments on a technological level and we have to be ahead on this – we have to understand what is going on and we have to try to provide answers to it,” she commented. “So we need to be at the table where they discuss about the technological development, where they discuss standardisation.”

De Bolle added: “The area we are working in and the technological evolution we are dealing with - the innovation used by criminals, the web-based criminality - it is huge”

She suggested that Europol should become the driver for modernising EU police forces by developing its own digital tools and technology, but conceded that the organisation would need more financial and political support.

There have been a number of revelations about police tracking mobile users over the years. For instance, in 2014 it was revealed that mobile users in the UK were being actively tracked by the police and other organisations, while phones being taken into police custody were being remotely wiped.

The following year, over 20 fake transmission towers, used to track mobile users, were discovered in London over a three week period – but the Met Police refused to confirm or deny their existence.

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