While we're sure social media sites are busy moderating "misinformation" once again ahead of the all-important 2024 election, one influencer is using Instagram to give his followers tips on sneaking into Britain and making £6,000 a month working illegally in the drug trade.
'You know there are a lot of brothers and sisters in hardship. Can you show how to go there unnoticed, without being detected? How do they do it?' he says in one of his video clips.
Kozak Braci, an Albanian social media influencer with over 500,000 followers on TikTok and Instagram, has hosted live tours of cannabis farms and offered insights into profiting from criminal activities in the UK during his streams, according to a new profile from the Daily Mail.
The Daily Mail reported that one image captures Braci standing beside a man in a black SUV, with a house displaying the Union flag in the background. In another photo, the influencer, whose chest and right arm are adorned with tattoos of AK-47s, sports a Chelsea shirt in front of a red Audi.
Braci, who boasts that he earns £25,000 a month from his social media platforms, frequently posts pictures of himself with luxury cars and designer items.
"It's great to stay in the cannabis house. I can live there without a problem," he tells his followers.
Graham Wettone, an ex-Met Police officer, reacted to the videos shown to him by characterizing them as glorifying drug production in the UK and enticing would-be criminals to come to Britain.
Earlier this year, it was revealed that the Home Office intends to pay Albanian influencers £100,000 to discourage their followers from entering Britain illegally. This modern twist on the public information film aims to reach groups susceptible to traffickers' falsehoods. The initiative, devised by Cass Horowitz of 'Brand Rishi' fame, has been criticized by activists as ineffective 'toy town tinkering.'
A United Nations report indicates that Albanian criminals now dominate the UK's cocaine market, importing the drug via south-east England's ports with the aid of violent European gangs. Among these, the Hellbanianz gang from East London openly flaunts its criminal endeavors on social media.
Additionally, in the first four months of the year, 80 Albanian migrants were collectively sentenced to 130 years in prison.
Tik Tok commented: "TikTok works closely with UK law enforcement, the National Crime Agency and organisations such as STOP THE TRAFFIK to fight this industry-wide issue, and our steadfast efforts helped reduce the number of small boat crossings last year, according to Border Officials. We continue to strictly maintain a zero tolerance approach to human exploitation and proactively find over 95% of content we remove for breaking these rules."
Meta responded: "We have removed the violating content brought to our attention. Buying, selling or soliciting drugs is not allowed on our platforms; our teams use a mix of technology and human review to remove this content as quickly as possible, and we work with the police and youth organisations to get better at detection."
