LA METAMORFOSI DEL CRIMINE ORGANIZZATO NELL¿ERA DIGITALE

This research examines the contemporary evolution of organised crime within the digital environment, focusing on the progressive integration of modern technologies into criminal structures and operations, and assessing the resulting implications for criminal law and procedural frameworks. More than twenty years after the Palermo Convention, organised crime continues to demonstrate a remarkable capacity for adaptation, exploiting the opportunities offered by cyberspace while benefiting from the slow responsiveness of legislative and enforcement systems. Unlike traditional interpretations linking organised crime to social underdevelopment, its digital expansion appears to stem from an overabundance of technological opportunities, rather than structural social deficits. The study first analyses the distinctive features of cyberspace that facilitate criminal activity, including its regulatory fragmentation, immateriality, deterritorialisation, data volatility, and the commodification of criminal techniques. Particular attention is devoted to digital tools and platforms commonly employed by criminal organisations, such as the deep and dark web, encrypted communication services, cryptocurrencies, and illicit online marketplaces, as well as to recent law enforcement operations involving platforms like EncroChat and SkyECC. The research further adopts an expanded categorisation of cybercrime, distinguishing between cyber-enabled and cyber-dependent offences, in order to provide a more nuanced analytical framework. Building on this contextual groundwork, the research differentiates between traditional organised crime groups that have migrated into cyberspace and criminal organisations that are natively cyber-based. For the former, the analysis investigates how digital technologies have altered operational methods without fundamentally transforming criminal objectives, and evaluates the adequacy and adaptability of existing substantive and procedural criminal law instruments. Key legal challenges examined include encrypted communications, digital evidence, cryptocurrencies, online money laundering, and dark web markets, with a particular focus on fundamental rights and supranational regulatory responses. The final part of the research addresses cyber-organised crime, questioning its classification within traditional organised crime paradigms. Through an examination of case law and doctrinal interpretations of criminal association, the study highlights the tensions between established legal categories and emerging, decentralised, and technologically driven criminal communities, ultimately underscoring the need for a rethinking of investigative and normative approaches in the digital age.