Belgium's national drug commissioner, Ine Van Wymersch, has revealed that criminal gangs are using Airbnb-type short-term rentals as stash houses for money, drugs, weapons, and even people. Speaking to the Guardian, she noted that authorities don't have a precise idea of the scale, but criminals are clearly enjoying the flexibility of booking a pad for a few days - especially when a cargo boat's arrival time is, shall we say, fluid.
"You need someone to pick up a cargo from the harbour. You don't know exactly when the boat will arrive. Well, you can hire an Airbnb apartment or studio for three days. It's very flexible. If the boat is not coming to Antwerp but going to Marseille, there is free cancellation," she explained, painting a picture of drug lords as savvy travelers who value a good refund policy.
Van Wymersch acknowledged that short-term rental companies serve "a very good legal purpose" but need to be more resilient to abuse. One weekend in early August, police seized 3.3kg of cocaine and €4,845 (£4,140) in cash from an Airbnb-rented apartment in central Brussels, believed to be a drug storage and packing hub. In 2024, 11 people were sentenced for their roles in a massive Belgium-UK drug trafficking operation, which included the seizure of €21m worth of drugs from an Airbnb rental in Staden, West Flanders.
Airbnb declined to comment directly but pointed to Clément Eulry, its country manager for France and the Benelux, who told De Standaard that such bookings represent "an extreme minority" among millions of annual transactions. He claimed the company uses AI to flag suspicious bookings and always reports problematic renters to police - because nothing says 'we take this seriously' like an algorithm and a polite email.
But short-term rentals are just one slice of the modern convenience pie that organized crime is devouring. Van Wymersch cited anonymous email accounts, encrypted communications, cryptocurrency, and the ubiquity of parcel delivery as enablers. "The fact that e-commerce is booming business is facilitating enormously organised crime," she said. Delivery firms are "very at risk" because a white van stopping at a neighbor's house is no longer suspicious - it's just Tuesday.
Van Wymersch, who became Belgium's first-ever national drug commissioner in 2023 after Antwerp solidified its status as a top European cocaine gateway, is no stranger to the chaos. Her appointment followed a wave of drug-fueled violence, including an alleged plot to kidnap the justice minister in 2022, grenade attacks in Antwerp, and the fatal shooting of an 11-year-old girl caught in gang crossfire. Last year, an anonymous investigative judge forced into hiding warned that Belgium risked becoming a narco state - a term Van Wymersch herself coined. She agrees: "If we don't do anything, we are at risk to become a narco state … where you don't know any more who are the good guys and who are the bad guys."
Her strategy? Go after the money. "This multi-headed monster only has one heart and that's the money," she said, targeting small businesses like hairdressers, nail bars, and night shops used for laundering. She urges local authorities to inspect "the dodgy shop" in their neighborhoods, because "all these small businesses are one big network." Gangs have shifted from top-down hierarchies to loose, anonymous networks where criminals "don't know to which network they are belonging any more." It's "crime as a service," she says, and it's very opportunistic.
Van Wymersch's "iceberg strategy" acknowledges that shootings and explosions are just the visible tip; below the surface lie drunk-driving deaths, drug-fueled domestic violence, and sexual offenses. To truly melt the iceberg, society needs to give young people a stake - through education, anti-poverty strategies, housing, and adequate pay for delivery workers. "We need to invest in warming up the temperature of the water," she said, which is a lovely metaphor for social spending.
Brussels is feeling the heat: police recorded 101 shootings in 2025, a record high, often from turf wars. Van Wymersch links the violence to social problems: "The people that are shooting are people without any perspective." In Brussels, 12.8% of people aged 15-29 are not in education, employment, or training, above the national average. "It is naive to believe that a purely repressive approach will reduce the number of shootings," she said. "We will see fewer shootings only when there are fewer vulnerable people."
The European Holiday Home Association, representing Airbnb and others, said companies are best placed to respond. Van Wymersch's team plans to reach out to booking platforms: "What we want to know now is what are the criteria for suspicious booking, what can we learn from that, how can we help you to be more resilient."