Following the money and hunting the conspirators

On the international level, the U.S. takes part in the Financial Activities Task Force (FATF), a unit of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. FATF promotes transparency in international economic transactions and publishes a list of countries with bank secrecy laws that encourage money-laundering across boundaries. FATF then recommends countermeasures that penalize the banks in those countries. Right now, some 19 countries, large and small, are on the list, including: Cook Islands, Dominica, Egypt, Guatemala, Grenada, Hungary, Indonesia, Israel, Lebanon, Marshall Islands, Myanmar, Nauru, Nigeria, Niue, Philippines, Russia, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and the Ukraine. Russia has recently passed legislation that will help remove it from the list.

Tracing electronic movements of money may seem to some like a threat to civil liberties, but the law has long made a distinction between the exercise of financial resources and the recording of those activities. In America we encourage the free flow of finances, but keep the ability for law enforcement to trace their movements. This tradition, combined with the transparency of financial information systems, may help take down the networks that supported these sworn enemies of America.

Links ...

Financial Crimes Enforcement Network: http://www.ustreas.gov/fincen/

OECD Financial Action Task Force: http://www.oecd.org/fatf/

FBI’s Internet Fraud Complaint Center, also for reporting terrorist activities: http://www1.ifccfbi.gov/index.asp

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