Cyber Criminals Aren’t Always Who You Imagine Them to Be
Enablers can be your local suburban Accountants or Lawyers who haven’t done their due diligence, are engaged in risky business recovery activities or simply fulfilling their personal financial greed. They aren’t always the Hardcore Criminals or hackers that are thought of when imagining Cyber Criminals.
Personalities and Behaviours Mapped into Cyber Criminal Personas
The Australian Serious Financial Crime Taskforce have developed Personas to help communicate the various groups of individuals that participate in Cyber Crime.
- The Hardcore Criminal: the key instigator, overseer and beneficiary of the most serious financial crimes. Often, these individuals are members of or linked to organised (international) crime syndicates or groups.
- The Lieutenant: a person who works for Hardcore Criminals to source and manage the different resources and Enablers they need. They will typically be unaware of the full extent of the crimes that “their employer” is involved in; knowing only about their “piece of the puzzle”.
- The Launderer: sets up companies and money flow structures that make illegally gained proceeds (dirty money) appear legal (clean). Often having the skills to navigate off-shore financial schemes.
- The Straw Director: the director of a company/companies destined to be liquidated within a short period of time, or a shell company that has been set up with the intention of avoiding tax and other liabilities. Unpaid bills, delayed employee wage payments and amassing debt are indicators of this type of company director.
- The Phoenix Operator: someone who deliberately winds up or abandons a company (typically within a year) leaving its debts behind and no one to chase. Comfortable with bribing (bonuses, gifts, commissions, etc) others to “look the other way”.
- The Enabler: are professionals with advance professional skills and networks who help facilitate serious financial crime. These can be individuals who may be older and more advanced in their careers and may display signs of “living beyond their means”.
- Cyber Criminal: these people use technology to gain access to information and sensitive data which can be used to facilitate a range of crimes, including tax crimes and identity theft. May have unexplainably large holdings of cryptocurrencies.
- The Fixer: a person who profits by facilitating offshore tax evasion. They are often highly versed in tax havens and the services available to help individuals, dodgy companies and criminal syndicates conceal the sources of their money. Like Cyber Criminals, they are users of the Dark Web.
- The Tax Fraud: someone who intentionally avoids paying local taxes. They may masquerade as Tax and Investment Advisers to find Enablers to assist in the conduct and concealment of their crimes. The Tax Fraud is adept at providing false and misleading statements.
- The Rorter: are individuals who lie or withholds information to fraudulently access government subsidies and other financial support programs. During the COVID-19 pandemic, these people have falsified paperwork and “double dipped” on stimulus measures to falsely increase entitlement payments.
Courtesy of the Australian Serious Financial Crime Taskforce | Indentikit
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