Search results for "Criminal network"
showing 8 items of 8 documents
Robust link prediction in criminal networks: A case study of the Sicilian Mafia
2020
Abstract Link prediction exercises may prove particularly challenging with noisy and incomplete networks, such as criminal networks. Also, the link prediction effectiveness may vary across different relations within a social group. We address these issues by assessing the performance of different link prediction algorithms on a mafia organization. The analysis relies on an original dataset manually extracted from the judicial documents of operation “Montagna”, conducted by the Italian law enforcement agencies against individuals affiliated with the Sicilian Mafia. To run our analysis, we extracted two networks: one including meetings and one recording telephone calls among suspects, respect…
Social Network Analysis of Sicilian Mafia Interconnections
2019
In this paper, we focus on the study of Sicilian Mafia organizations through Social Network Analysis. We analyse datasets reflecting two different Mafia Families, based on examinations of digital trails and judicial documents, respectively. The first dataset includes the phone calls logs among suspected individuals. The second one is based on police traces of meeting that have taken place among different types of criminals. Our breakthrough is twofold. First in the method followed to generate these new datasets. Second, in the method used to carry out a quantitative phenomena investigation that are hard to evaluate. Our networks are weighted ones, with each weight catching the frequency of …
The Whole Is Greater than the Sum of the Parts: A Multilayer Approach on Criminal Networks
2022
Traditional social network analysis can be generalized to model some networked systems by multilayer structures where the individual nodes develop relationships in multiple layers. A multilayer network is called multiplex if each layer shares at least one node with some other layer. In this paper, we built a unique criminal multiplex network from the pre-trial detention order by the Preliminary Investigation Judge of the Court of Messina (Sicily) issued at the end of the Montagna anti-mafia operation in 2007. Montagna focused on two families who infiltrated several economic activities through a cartel of entrepreneurs close to the Sicilian Mafia. Our network possesses three layers which sha…
Graph Comparison and Artificial Models for Simulating Real Criminal Networks
2021
Network Science is an active research field, with numerous applications in areas like computer science, economics, or sociology. Criminal networks, in particular, possess specific topologies which allow them to exhibit strong resilience to disruption. Starting from a dataset related to meetings between members of a Mafia organization which operated in Sicily during 2000s, we here aim to create artificial models with similar properties. To this end, we use specific tools of Social Network Analysis, including network models (Barabási-Albert identified to be the most promising) and metrics which allow us to quantify the similarity between two networks. To the best of our knowledge, the DeltaCo…
Multilayer Network Analysis: The Identification of Key Actors in a Sicilian Mafia Operation
2021
Recently, Social Network Analysis studies have led to an improvement and to a generalization of existing tools to networks with multiple subsystems and layers of connectivity. These kind of networks are usually called multilayer networks. Multilayer networks in which each layer shares at least one node with some other layer in the network are called multiplex networks. Being a multiplex network does not require all nodes to exist on every layer. In this paper, we built a criminal multiplex network which concerns an anti-mafia operation called “Montagna” and it is based on the examination of a pre-trial detention order issued on March 14, 2007 by the judge for preliminary investigations of t…
Social network analysis: the use of graph distances to compare artificial and criminal networks
2021
Aim: Italian criminal groups become more and more dangerous spreading their activities into new sectors. A criminal group is made up of networks of hundreds of family gangs which extended their influence across the world, raking in billions from drug trafficking, extortion and money laundering. We focus in particular on the analysis of the social structure of two Sicilian crime families and we used a Social Network Analysis approach to study the social phenomena. Starting from a real criminal network extracted from meetings emerging from the police physical surveillance during 2000s, we here aim to create artificial models that present similar properties. Methods: We use specific tools of s…
Criminal Network. Politica, amministrazione, ambiente e mercato nelle trame della mafia.
2011
Il volume individua nuovi elementi analitici per lo studio dei sistemi di potere criminale, che hanno aggiornato i propri strumenti operativi adattando la propria struttura agli scenari attuali. Il quadro che emerge disegna una situazione nella quale non si assiste più a circoscritti casi di criminalità mafiosa, ma a strutturati e sistemici attentati ai fondamenti delle nostre democrazie. The book identifies new analytical elements for the study of criminal power systems that have upgraded their operating tools adapting their structure to current scenarios. Mafia crime cases are structured and systemic constituting a threat to our democracies.
Social network analysis approaches to study crime
2022
Social Network Analysis (SNA) studies groups of individuals and can be applied in a lot of areas such us organizational studies, psychology, economics, information science and criminology. One of the most important results of SNA has been the definition of a set of centrality measures (e.g., degree, closeness, betweenness, or clustering coefficient) which can be used to identify the most influential people with respect to their network of relationships. The main problem with computing centrality metrics on social networks is the typical big size of the data. From the computational point of view, SNA represents social networks as graphs composed of a set of nodes connected by another set of …