The U.S. House of Representatives Tuesday unanimously passed a bill aimed at foreign banks that provide financial services to Hezbollah, an Iran-backed, Lebanon-based Shiite militant group.
An EU plan approved Thursday that could force banks in member-states to open accounts for most applicants would complicate anti-money laundering compliance efforts, according to critics.
Despite tightened controls on interbank messaging, some bankers looking to hide the role of their blacklisted clients in international wires need only type a single key on their keyboard, according to experts.
The EU is pushing the United States for answers following reports that the National Security Agency siphoned bank messaging data held in the European Union, possibly in violation of a July 2010 treaty.
A group of European Parliament members will soon weigh in on whether lawmakers should create an EU-wide police force and more closely cooperate on border security to stem financial crime, according to Bill Newton Dunn, a British lawmaker.
A transactional data handover mandated under a $102 million settlement disclosed Tuesday between the U.S. Justice Department and a defunct Beirut bank will likely lead to new financial crime investigations.
As U.S. officials work to shield American prepaid cards from abuse by financial crooks, foreign-issued stored value products remain a relatively easy avenue to move money into the United States anonymously.
A decision by the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals affirming sanctions against Jordan's largest bank for not turning over data on suspicious accounts could leave some financial institutions with an unwanted choice, say attorneys.
The U.S. Treasury Department Friday fined a Sioux Falls, SD bank branch $10 million for not properly reporting instances of suspected structuring and terrorist financing.
Increases in the rates that U.S. states tax cigarette purchasers has led to a rise in tobacco smuggling by organized crime groups and terrorist financiers, say governmental officials.
U.S. officials have launched a criminal investigation after linking data seized at Osama bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan to a Bank Secrecy Act report, counterterrorism investigators said Monday.
The disclosure that U.S. officials have solicited and directly received data from foreign banks on transactions tied to Iran is spurring talks among European lawmakers, according to Alexander Alvaro, an EU Parliament supervisor.
A European Union plan to detect terrorist financing by allowing investigators access to financial messaging information has met strong opposition from European lawmakers concerned about data privacy rights and budgetary constraints.
A European Union Commission report published Thursday concluded that U.S. Treasury officials had abided by all data security provisions contained within a controversial transatlantic bank data sharing treaty.
A European Union bill that places anti-money laundering requirements on offshore investment vehicles and drafts their national regulators to certify the funds' compliance with EU laws was approved Monday.
The rejection by the EU Parliament Thursday of a data sharing agreement with the United States is likely to leave U.S. investigators without timely access to European banking data for the second month in a row.
EU party leaders have rejected delaying a Thursday vote on an interim agreement to share European financial data with U.S. counterterrorism investigators.
The Belgian-based consortium plans to open the center by then end of 2009 as part of an effort to restructure how financial data is transmitted internationally.
The Bush administration suffered a setback Friday when a federal judge rejected its effort to block a civil lawsuit against an international banking consortium that provides the administration with data for terrorist investigations.
The agreement, announced June 27, resulted from months of negotiations after an EU advisory panel found that the consortium's sharing of information with the United States violated EU data protection laws.