Swatting: a Saint-Malo mother targeted 16 times by false police alerts
Originating in the United States, this type of dangerous prank involves sending law enforcement to private individuals' homes under false pretences. A resident of Saint-Malo has been subjected to this harassment for two years.
Swatting: a Saint-Malo mother targeted 16 times by false police alerts
Swatting, a practice imported from the United States, is causing increasing concern among French authorities. This phenomenon involves triggering false alerts in order to send police to private individuals' homes under false pretences, often of a dramatic nature.
A mother living in Saint-Malo has been facing this ordeal for two years. She has been targeted sixteen times by these malicious pranks. Each time, law enforcement arrives at her home convinced they will discover a crime scene. One of these interventions was particularly traumatic: the police believed they would find five dead people in the house.
These false alerts mobilise significant police resources and plunge victims into a state of permanent stress. Swatting is considered a criminal offence in France, liable to penalties of up to several years' imprisonment depending on the severity of the consequences.
Source: franceinfo
Source: France Info