Police coordinated by the European Union’s justice agency have taken down computer networks responsible for spreading ransomware via infected emails.

International prosecutors say that investigations triggered by the cracking of encrypted phones three years ago have so far led to more than 6,500 arrests worldwide and the seizure of hundreds of tons of drugs.

Authorities in the U.S. and Europe have arrested nearly 300 people and seized over $53 million in the latest major takedown of a dark web marketplace.

Europol says law enforcement authorities in six different countries have joined forces to take down a “super cartel” of drugs traffickers controlling about one third of the cocaine trade in Europe.

European Union police and the judicial agencies Europol and Eurojust said Wednesday that investigators took control of the infrastructure behind the botnet known as Emotet. “Emotet was one of the largest, if not the largest, botnets delivering a wide variety of malware. The Emotet botnet was effectively used to manage the infection of victims and provide a distributed bulwark against takedown attempts by authorities. Earlier this week, authorities in Bulgaria took down a dark web site that NetWalker used to communicate with its victims, the FBI statement said. The Emotet and NetWalker operations build on an effort by Microsoft late last year to disrupt a different botnet known as Trickbot that was also used in ransomware attacks.

(AP Photo/Hau Dinh)HANOI, Vietnam -- Vietnamese authorities are conducting intensive contact tracing after the country’s first confirmed local transmission of the coronavirus in 89 days. The flight attendant tested positive on Saturday, the Tuoi Tre newspaper said. The new case ended Vietnam’s streak of 89 days without any known local transmission of the virus. The country has reported 1,347 coronavirus cases, including 35 deaths. State Health Officer Dr. Thomas Dobbs said Monday on Twitter that the record comes ahead of an “anticipated Thanksgiving acceleration” in coronavirus cases.

The international police operation “2BaGoldMule” led by Portuguese investigators and the FBI included 14 more European countries, under the umbrella of Europol. Europol said that more than 40 homes were searched by agents in Spain, Italy, Bulgaria and Latvia in the operation. The ring laundered money stolen from victims in the U.S. and European countries. The suspects face criminal investigations in the U.S., Portugal, Spain and the U.K.“This operation has shown that through this cooperation we can collectively tackle the global nature of cybercrime. This is the only way forward,” said Carlos Cabreiro, director of Portugal’s National Unit for Fighting Cybercrime.

European police and judicial authorities said they expect the investigation to send shockwaves through organized crime gangs across the continent. The encrypted platform was used by 60,000 people worldwide, including around 10,000 in Britain, British police said. The service pushed a message to all its users on June 13 alerting them that their systems had been breached and urging users to throw away their phones, European Union police agency Europol added. “Now, what seems to be possible only in thrillers and police series we’ve actually seen happen before our own eyes,” Kraag said. “This operation demonstrates that criminals will not get away with using encrypted devices to plot vile crimes under the radar," Patel said.