The online 'superstars' driving UK drug trade

Social media giants are helping fuel an influx of Albanian drug workers into Britain by allowing influencers to promote a criminal lifestyle and become superstars. Sunday Express investigations editor ZAK GARNER-PURKIS reports

- ZAK GARNER-PURKI

ONE OF the country's biggest online celebrities, Aleks Visha rose to fame through live virtual tours of UK cannabis farms and online boasts about him and his brother Dor's criminal exploits.

Between them, they have more than a million followers on various social media platforms.

Aleks, dubbed the "King of TikTok", claims in one clip to be overseeing a British drugs empire producing up to 2,300 plants every two months.

In another, he calls up his brother - who himself boasts a social media following of more than 200,000 to celebrate a "harvest".

Dor and Aleks are far from alone in sharing these types of videos.

A major Sunday Express investigation uncovered viral Albanian language content, viewed millions of times, which promotes the lifestyle of UK drug workers who have illegally travelled to Britain, even showing viewers how to travel here.

We also discovered how Albanian language videos promoting UK drug farms have been posted on Tik Tok and Instagram for years.

From digital wanted posters seeking information on thieves to clips of violent robberies, our dossier of evidence reveals how social media is being harnessed by gangs as a tool for crime.

Vulnerable Albanian teenagers are regularly exposed to their posts, encouraging them to travel to Britain illegally to get rich quick, according to young people we interviewed in the capital Tirana.

Instagram and Tiktok took down content highlighted to them by the Sunday Express but neither removed the accounts of the two brothers.

Last night former Home Secretary Priti Patel declared: “The British public will be disgusted by TikTok and Instagram for allowing criminals to promote their lifestyles and encourage others to come to Britain illegally to produce drugs.