Money transfers could face anti-terrorism scrutiny {no minimum dollar amount}

[Land Shark]

Source: Washington Post

Financial institutions are now required to report to the Treasury Department transactions in excess of $10,000 and others they deem suspicious. The new rule would require banks to disclose even the smallest transfers.

Treasury officials plan to post the proposed regulation on their Web site Monday and in the Federal Register this week. The public could comment before a final rule is published and the plan takes effect, which officials say will probably not be until 2012.

The proposal is a long-delayed response to the 2004 Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act, which specified reforms to better organize the intelligence community and to avoid a repeat of the 2001 attacks. The law required that the Treasury secretary issue regulations requiring financial institutions to report cross-border transfers if deemed necessary to combat terrorist financing.

"This regulation is outrageous," said Peter Djinis, a lawyer who advises financial institutions on complying with financial rules and a former FinCEN executive assistant director for regulatory policy. "Consider me old-fashioned, but I believe you need to show some evidence of criminality before you are granted unfettered access to the private financial affairs of every individual and company that dares to conduct financial transactions overseas."

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/26/AR2010092603941.html

---

This is allegedly justified by the desire to better understand "patterns" of possible terrorist financing. If actually authorized by the 2004 act, it means that resident Bush's Treasury Department never saw fit to issue these regulations or seek this power.

on edit: Federal officials could freely seize anybody's money coming from abroad and claim it is "terrorist financing" and a person demanding their money might well regret ever asking for it. It could help guarantee no foreign funding of US political parties or candidates so long as they are NOT part of the party in power.

Press Release from FinCEN: http://www.fincen.gov/news_room/nr/html/20100927.html

ACTUAL proposed regs sent to Federal Register Today: http://www.fincen.gov/statutes_regs/frn/pdf/Treasury_FinCEN_Proposed%20Rule_Cross%20Border%20Electronic%20Transmittal%20of%20Funds.pdf

[ixion]

1. Hurray for Freedom!

:sarcasm:

[Demeter]

2. Please Sir, May I Have Some More?

This has GOT to Stop!

[Curmudgeoness]

3. For all the money given to Homeland Security, they are too lazy

to actually do the foot work involved in finding questionable transactions. Just give us ALL the information, and then we will never be able to sort through it all anyways. Well, if you give us more money to hire more administrators, maybe then we could.

[Land Shark]

4. They will have the requisite motivation when a political target / enemy is involved. nt

[Curmudgeoness]

8. Sadly, that is true. But real terrorists will only be found after the fact. nt

[smiley_glad_hands]

5. Actually, I like this idea.

We're talking money coming in and out of the country. Follow the MONEY and I'm sure you'll find quite alot of interesting things and not just terrorism funding.

Just leave the rest of us alone.

[Cal Carpenter]

6. I'm sure you are aware there are lots of people, and businesses large and small

who legitimately need transfer of funds on a regular basis overseas. The economy is global now, that's all there is to it. Whether it's buying and selling goods, or sending $200 bucks to your kid spending the semester abroad, or god forbid to a friend or relative in a middle eastern country... this sounds waaay too overreaching to me.

[smiley_glad_hands]

11. Respectfully, I disagree.

Like I said, follow the money....drugs, corruption, espionage, foreign electioneering.

I don't have any money to wire, nor do i know anyone overseas.....just my 2 cents.

[Cal Carpenter]

14. Your personal experience may not coincide with the big picture

but I find it hard to believe that you don't realize that thousands upon thousands of businesses and individuals need international financial transactions everyday that are perfectly legitimate and are not related to terrorism. How do you think the economy works?!

:wtf:

[smiley_glad_hands]

15. Uh duh....

I know exactly how the economy works and I also know how the law works and there is nothing wrong with the government having access at national security levels or by subpoena at criminal levels to a database of all financial transactions coming into and out of this country.

Most of this can already be done, government just wants to centralize it and make the process of getting said info more efficient.

[JDPriestly]

19. They will trace small transfers just to embarrass people who have

family or other overseas connections. And remember Eliot Spitzer. No. He should not have been involved with a prostitute. But really, Vitter -- Ensign -- one Republican after the other in compromised situations much worse than Spitzer's and they are holding on to their jobs.

This is not a positive development. It is Big Brother getting bigger and bigger. I don't transfer money overseas, but I know people who do and they have legitimate reasons for doing it.

[2 Much Tribulation]

23. Agreed. And FOIA demands for other transfers? Denied. nt

[girl gone mad]

16. Hi.

:hi:

Now you do know someone who regularly wires money overseas.

[JDPriestly]

18. Right! The international transfer of money is commonplace.

It would be impossible to monitor all the small transactions.

[Land Shark]

10. Yes, it's clear that if Stalinist controls are set up, we can essentially eliminate crime

I hear it was safe to walk the streets anywhere during Stalin's time (from thugs). But when that is achieved, the state itself is the crime.

[dixiegrrrrl]

7. So every immigrant who sends money to his family in Mexico

can have it seized while he is being investigated?
I am really surprised Mexico is not furious about this, since it depends on those money transfers
for revenue. I read somewhere that money from migrants is the 2nd largest ( legal) source of income in Mexico.
I got reported to the IRS for taking my savings account out of a bank that had bad ratings.
Sure enough, IRS tried to tax me on it, claiming it was "income", I had to get my tax man involved.
Now disgruntled bank employees can report ANY amount of money coming in or out of the bank?

This is another brick in the wall and one reason I no longer keep more than 2 months expenses in banks.

[Land Shark]

9. Every person sending or receiving a transfer has SS# or TaxID reported to Feds each year

The above is a core request of the proposed regulations. (The seizure of money is just a probability if corrupt hands get involved...)

http://www.fincen.gov/news_room/nr/html/20100927.html (press release)

http://www.fincen.gov/statutes_regs/frn/pdf/Treasury_FinCEN_Proposed%20Rule_Cross%20Border%20Electronic%20Transmittal%20of%20Funds.pdf (actual proposed regulations)

[JoeyTrib]

17. I'm thinkin this will be used on political enemies

Depending on whose in office.

[Land Shark]

21. It's notable for its rarity - those cases where it is NOT used that way. nt

[EFerrari]

12. A whole new spin to Big Brother and the Holding Company.

K&R

[fascisthunter]

13. Holy Crap

it gets worse everyday. Government appears might hungry for more power. I'm not liking this at all. They have enough power.

[2 Much Tribulation]

24. +1

[midnight]

20. K&R

[2 Much Tribulation]

22. Doubtful if regulatory authority under the 2004 Act included catching things besides terrorism

But that doesn't stop them from selling this based on other applications