Impact Of Terrorist Financing

The impact of terrorist financing is usually discussed at a national security level. For an Australian business the exposure is narrower and more practical.

Very few organisations are targeted. A larger number are used, because a transaction, an account or a service passes through them and nobody looked closely.

The consequences for a reporting entity follow from that. Enforcement action for failures in customer identification, monitoring or reporting. Remediation costs, which are typically far larger than the compliance programme would have been. Banking relationships being reviewed or withdrawn. And reputational damage that lands regardless of intent, because the public distinction between being complicit and being careless is thin.

The reforms extending the regime to further professions widen the group of organisations for whom this is a live question.

AUSTRAC regulates the Australian regime. This is general information rather than legal advice, and obligations vary by state and territory.

See Sentrient’s AML CTF training course and GRC system.