Financial Crime Matters

Kieran talks with Eliza Odom, former Section Chief of the FBI’s Counterterrorism Division, about the top terror threats the bureau is currently focused on.

While having since become deputy assistant director of the FBI’s Weapons of Mass Destruction Directorate, Eliza discusses the seven units within the Counterterrorism Division she once oversaw, particularly focusing on the Financial Targeting and Analysis Unit, and its role interdicting terror funding.

While deeply concerned about the actions of home-grown extremists, Eliza also details the need for global cooperation and vigilance from the private sector to address the rising threat of cross border financed terror attacks in the wake of war in the Middle East.

Kieran talks with Hennie Verbeek-Kusters, head of the Netherlands financial intelligence unit, about her leadership over the FIU since its founding in 2008.

During their discussion, Hennie details how the Dutch FIU has evolved to face the challenge of evermore sophisticated transnational criminal organizations and the professional money launderers they now utilize. The effort to track and seize drug money has, she says, taken on a new urgency with the unprecedented rise of violence by organized drug traffickers in the Netherlands in past few years.

Kieran talks with Molly Moeser, Acting Chief, Money Laundering and Asset Recovery Section of the U.S. Justice Department, about MLARS’ efforts to seize illicit assets and, when possible, bring financial restitution to victims of crime.

During their talk, Molly discusses the seizure of illicit funds associated with kleptocracy and other crimes, including crypto assets, which require “a whole of government approach” that enlists experts throughout law enforcement.

Molly also touches on the importance of MLARS’ relationships with the private sector in identifying and seizing criminal proceeds, both as a source of intelligence and cooperative partner.

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This Financial Crime Matters episode is sponsored by:

Moody's - www.moodys.com/KYC

Kieran talks with Jennifer Shasky Calvery, Group Head of Financial Crime Risk at HSBC, a former Director of the Financial Crime Enforcement Network, or FinCEN, and former federal prosecutor.

Drawing on her public and private sector experience, Jen details the challenges faced by financial institutions and government and how in partnership they can detect illicit funds and catch bad actors.

Jen also talks with Kieran about HSBC’s recent partnership with Google AML AI and the promise artificial intelligence holds for financial institutions and law enforcement.

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This Financial Crime Matters episode is sponsored by:

Focal - www.getfocal.ai

HAWK:AI - www.hawk.ai

Moody's - www.moodys.com/KYC

Kieran talks with Daniel Stipano, partner at Davis Polk & Wardwell and a 30-year veteran of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, about the unfolding requirements of the Corporate Transparency and AML Acts and their impact on law enforcement, and financial as well as non-financial institutions.

Dan also weighs in on the current court challenges to the CTA, particularly the recent Federal court ruling that declared it unconstitutional, what the Financial Crime Enforcement Network’s latest rule-makings mean, and what the long-awaited revised customer due diligence rule might look like.

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This Financial Crime Matters episode is sponsored by:

SymphonyAI - www.symphonyai.com

Kieran talks with ACAMS colleagues Justine Walker, head of global sanctions and AML risk, and Craig Timm, senior AML director, about the just released “ACAMS Global AFC Threats 2024.”

Drawing on 788 in-depth interactions with anti-financial crime professionals that inform the report, Justine and Craig identify the top ten threats currently facing the global AFC community, including budget cuts at financial institutions, the rise of cyber-enabled crime, the fallout from global conflict, and more.

While detailing the threats, Justine and Craig also talk about how anti-financial crime professionals are responding and how financial institutions can prepare for the threats in their own AFC efforts.

Read the Global AFC Threats Report 2024 here: https://www.acamstoday.org/global-afc-threats-report

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This Financial Crime Matters episode is sponsored by:

Focal - https://www.getfocal.ai

SymphonyAI - www.symphonyai.com

HAWK:AI - www.hawk.ai

Thomson Reuters - www.tr.com/risk-fraud

Kieran talks with Grant Rabenn, Director, Financial Crimes Legal at Coinbase.

Grant, a former federal prosecutor who handled some of the Department of Justice’s earliest crypto cases, discusses the promise of blockchain offerings, while acknowledging the industry’s need to work with regulators to stem their use in financial crime and money laundering.

During their conversation, Grant also touches some of the typologies for the illicit use of crypto currency that Coinbase encounters and the value of using a variety of blockchain forensics providers to trace crypto transactions.

Kieran talks with Zeke Faux, author of critically acclaimed “Number Go Up,” a comprehensive look at cryptocurrency, DeFi, and NFTs.

Zeke, an investigative reporter for Bloomberg BusinessWeek and Bloomberg News, discusses the trek he undertook to understand the boom and sometimes bust of various blockchain offerings. It was a journey that included a New York harbor NFT “ApeFest,” time in the Philippines with erstwhile Axis Infinity gamers who lost everything, a visit to a hotel in Cambodia attached to a “pig butchering” operation, and finally a marathon interview with Sam Bankman-Fried in the Bahamas days before his arrest.

Kieran talks with Kenneth Rijock, a former Miami-based lawyer who spent a decade as a bag man for drug-traffickers, investing their cash in accounts in the Caribbean and other offshore secrecy havens.

Ken describes some of the classic methods he used for laundering money and how law enforcement ultimately caught up with him. Following a prison term, Ken reinvented himself as an anti-money laundering advisor to law enforcement and subsequently the private sector. His story is also told in his book, “The Laundryman,” published in 2012.

Kieran talks with Carly Yoost, CEO and founder of the Child Rescue Coalition, which has created technology that enables law enforcement to identify instances of online child exploitation and locate its perpetrators.

During their discussion, Carly details the scope of online child exploitation and how the Coalition provides tools and training to law enforcement in 98 countries that has led to the arrest of over 14,700 child predators.