Backgrounder: Working in partnership with the private sector to counter extortion

Overview

Through dedicated outreach and engagement activities, the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada (FINTRAC) will surge a range of integrated actions to communicate trends, methodologies and indicators relevant to extortion. In collaboration with private sector partners, FINTRAC will ensure that financial entities have timely and practical intelligence and indicators to detect and report suspicious financial transactions related to the laundering of the proceeds of extortion. This will include early communication of sensitive information through trusted channels through new information sharing protocols, leveraging its broad partnership with law enforcement at all levels of jurisdiction, as well as public facing information for more general audiences implicated in the fight against extortion.

Rationale

Canada's Anti-Money Laundering and Anti-Terrorist Financing (AML/ATF) Regime is designed to counteract modern, international criminal and terrorist networks by sharing information through a strong, equipped and committed network of public and private sector leads. Central to that network has been the development and implementation of partnerships between Canadians businesses, law enforcement agencies and FINTRAC to address emerging threats, new areas of risk and to coordinate across key priorities. By working with Canadian businesses and law enforcement agencies throughout Canada, FINTRAC has been effective in following the money to identify potential subjects, uncovering broader financial connections and providing intelligence to advance national project-level investigations.

Key components

In order to address the increased threat of extortion by organized crime, FINTRAC will undertake a number of collaborative actions to strengthen the information flows across the AML/ATF regime with respect to the fight against extortion.

In the immediate term, FINTRAC will develop Targeted Indicator Profiles (TIP sheets) focused on extortion. These profiles will provide early indicators and typologies through trusted channels to support financial institutions and businesses to better understand and identify the latest criminal or money laundering practices relevant to extortion. This strategic intelligence will improve the timeliness and quality of suspicious transaction reports to FINTRAC, enhancing FINTRAC's ability to provide actionable intelligence to law enforcement.
As AML/ATF Supervisor, FINTRAC will convene sector-specific education and outreach events to provide information on trends, methods and indicators to those private sector entities best positioned to detect and report suspicious financial transactions related to extortion. FINTRAC will work with police of jurisdiction to make sure their expertise and on-the-ground knowledge can inform its advice and guidance to the private sector.
Following these sessions, FINTRAC will also publish a special bulletin that communicates to the wider reporting entity community strategic intelligence on money laundering activities related to extortion.

Working with partners across Canada's anti-money laundering, anti-terrorist financing regime, FINTRAC will supplement this outreach by leveraging existing public-private fora as a means of enhancing and expanding the collective knowledge base.

These actions will accelerate the development of strategic intelligence to support the private sector detection and reporting of suspicious financial transactions related to extortion. FINTRAC will analyse these reports to disclose financial intelligence to law enforcement and other disclosure recipients when there are reasonable grounds to suspect designated information is relevant to investigating or prosecuting a money laundering, terrorist activity financing, or sanctions evasion offence. Police of jurisdiction can then leverage FINTRAC's financial intelligence disclosures to obtain production orders for those financial entities and build the evidence for their investigations, charges, and asset forfeiture actions.

Expected outcomes

Canadian businesses in sectors most likely to have visibility on extortion-related financial transactions will be better positioned to detect and report these transactions to inform the financial intelligence that will support law enforcement investigations, and asset forfeiture actions.

Conclusion

By enhancing information sharing and providing timely strategic intelligence leveraging private sector and law enforcement insights, FINTRAC will reinforce the integrity of the financial system and provide the financial intelligence that can support law enforcement's actions to combat organized crime—and specifically extortion, as based on the lived experience of individuals, businesses and communities affected by this crime.

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