Mediterranean Sea migrant smuggling

According to the United Nations, human smuggling is defined as "the procurement, in order to obtain, directly or indirectly, a financial or other material benefit, of the illegal entry of a person into a State Party of which the person is not a national or a permanent resident." Civil unrest and poverty in the Middle East in the 21st century and changing European immigration policies have been seen large numbers of refugees and economic migrants fleeing their home countries. Migrants pay people-smuggling gangs to illegally take them across the Mediterranean to Southern Europe. Refugees and other migrants use different routes to the European Union due to varying immigration policies. In between January and September 2015, the most common was the Eastern Mediterranean. Additionally, 2015 saw a major increase in the number of migrants making the Eastern Mediterranean crossing; "There were nearly eight times more detections via the Eastern Mediterranean route in the first nine months of 2015 (401,000) than during the whole of 2014 (51,000)." The European Migration Network reports that the secondary movements of migrants upon arrival in Europe are heavily influenced by people smugglers. According to the United Nations, human smuggling is a crime. However, the number of human traffickers in Turkey increased from 4,641 in 2017 to 6,278 in 2018.

Because people smuggling is illegal, little is definitely known about the practice. What is known comes from interviews migrants and smugglers have given to journalists and the authorities.