🌎 Morgan Stanley Fined Over First Republic Insider Sales.  The investigation identified several breakdowns across different teams in the wealth-management department tasked with approving trades. WSJ

🌎 Succession: The Secret Lives of Vladimir Putin’s Sons.  These children cannot be found in state databases; since infancy, they’ve had cover documents typically made for spies. Dossier

🌎 Chiefs superfan ‘ChiefsAholic’ sentenced to 17.5 years for string of armed bank robberies.  Babudar pleaded guilty to bank robbery, money laundering, and transporting stolen property across state lines. ESPN 

🚩 Feds flag Chicago business magnate over tax fraud involving NFL players Chicago Tribune 

🌎 Secretive Cyprus-Registered Funds Were Used to Hide Megayachts and Luxury Real Estate Linked to Sanctioned Russian Banker.  Two megayachts linked to Andrei Kostin were hidden behind secretive investment funds in Cyprus, known as “registered alternative investment funds.” OCCRP

🌎 Russia’s Most Notorious Special Forces Unit Now Has Its Own Cyber Warfare Team.  Unit 29155 of Russia’s GRU military intelligence agency has branched out into brazen hacking operations with targets across the world. Wired

🔐 NSA, FBI, CISA, and Allies Issue Advisory about Russian Military Cyber Actors NSA

🌎 U.S. Tells Allies Iran Has Sent Ballistic Missiles to Russia.  The move comes as Russia steps up missile attacks on Ukrainian cities, killing dozens of civilians in recent days. WSJ

📕 Featured Report: Russia’s Cryptocurrency Pivot – Legislated Sanctions Evasion Chainalysis

🌎 Louis Vuitton clothes and Vegas hotels: Border agents spent big with money from Mexican cartels.  Garcia and another border officer helped a drug cartel move huge amounts of drugs across the border. LAT

🌎 Feds raid home of NYPD Commish Edward Caban.  Federal agents hit members of the nation’s biggest police force amid a stunning spate of raids on others in Mayor Eric Adams’ inner circle. NYP

🌎 How China and North Korea Are Saving Russia’s Military Machine From Grinding to a Halt.  Data shows Beijing exporting $300M per month in dual-use items to Moscow. Free Beacon

🌎 U.S. introduces new export curbs on advanced technology.  Besides quantum computing items, the curbs affect equipment for producing advanced semiconductors, additive manufacturing items to produce metal components, and more. CNN

📌 Japanese chip equipment firms count on China sales amid U.S. moves to block exports CNBC

📌 Netherlands takes on U.S. export controls, shipments of ASML machines CNBC

🌎 An American Church Thrived in Nicaragua. Then Its Pastors Went to Prison.  Evangelical pastors led by a Texas missionary were accused of money laundering in a widespread crackdown on religious groups. NYT

—

RUSSIA 

🇷🇺 $10M and a Fake Investor: How Putin Built a Conservative U.S. Media Startup WSJ

🇷🇺 Slovakia, Hungary draw more crude oil from Russia’s Tatneft after Lukoil sanctions S&P

🇷🇺 Moscow takes control over assets of Western companies Reuters

🇷🇺 Russian Airline Wants $100M From Canada for Seizing Its Giant Cargo Plane WSJ

🇷🇺 Russia raises forecast for 2024 oil, gas export revenues by $17.4B Reuters

—

CHINA

🇨🇳 Lawmakers want U.S. to address risks from Chinese agriculture drones Reuters

🇨🇳 Nvidia’s AI chips are cheaper to rent in China than U.S. FT

🇨🇳 Germany blocks CO2 vouchers for oil companies over fraud concerns in China Bloomberg

🇨🇳 South Korean chip executive detained again over tech leak to China Reuters

—

CORRUPTION & FINANCIAL CRIME

💸 Treasury recovers $1.3B in unpaid taxes from high-wealth tax dodgers AP

💸 Developer convicted of bribing Menendez pleads guilty to bank fraud Politico

💸 FBI busts musician’s elaborate AI-powered $10M streaming-royalty heist Ars

💸 Covid-19 Tax Frauds As Revenue Streams For Street Gangs Forbes

💸 Payments Firms Keep Fighting Fraud Refunds as New UK Rules Loom Bloomberg

—

CRYPTO & CYBER

🔐 Filings in Ryan Salame case discuss narcotics trafficking, prostitutes, bribery Protos

🔐 90% of crypto registrations in UK failed due to weak AML controls Cointelegraph

🔐 France’s hunt for Telegram CEO Pavel Durov: The inside story Politico

🔐 Therapy Sessions Exposed by Mental Health Care Firm’s Unsecured Database Wired

—

SANCTIONS

🚩 The Case for Strengthening Sanctions Regimes to Fight Corruption Columbia SIPA

🚩 China calls on the U.S. to end sanctions Semafor

🚩 U.S. imposes sanctions on companies linked to Arctic LNG 2 Reuters

🚩 For Some Russian Art Collectors, Uzbekistan Is How You Avoid Sanctions RFE

🚩 Sanctions complicate Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline project VOA

—

RESEARCH AND MULTIMEDIA

📘 Ecuador’s Risky War on Narcos New Yorker 

📘 New $72K Migrant Smuggling Routes to the U.S. Start With Charter Flights Reuters

📘 Money Laundering National Risk Assessment Singapore MAS

📘 A better anti-corruption machine Brookings

📘 Ransomware Victim Insights RUSI

📘 Standards and interoperability: The future of the global financial system Atlantic Council

📘 U.S. Foreign Extortion Prevention Act: New Tool in the Fight Against Global Corruption TI 

📘 How We Uncovered the Modus Operandi of Criminals Smuggling Illegal Gold out of Venezuela Pulitzer Center

📘 Illicit Drugs Are Undermining Pacific Security USIP

ILLICIT EDGE INSIGHTS

📌 China’s Oppression of the Uyghurs in Xinjiang

📌 How Are U.S. Financial Sanctions Developed?

📌 Top 10 Ways Iran Supports and Empowers Hamas

📌 Iran’s Nuclear Weapons Program: A Dangerous Evolution

📌 Top 10 Ways Money Launderers Are Caught Red-Handed 

📌 What are the Top 10 Books on Corruption, Kleptocracy, and Illicit Financing?

📌 What Are 10 Ways China Is Stealing Intellectual Property?

📌 These are Mexico’s Most Powerful Drug Cartels

📌 The Hypocrisy of Labeling Terrorists as ‘Militants’

📌 Sanctions and the IRGC: How Iran’s Paramilitary Group Profits from Economic Hardship

📌 What are the Arguments For and Against ESG?

VIDEOS

INFLUENCERS

Kim Zetter / Brian Krebs / Nicole Perlroth /
Josh Rogin / Ellen Nakashima / Matt Levitt /
Clarissa Ward / Gary Kasparov / Joseph Cox / Mark Dubowitz
Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya / Bill Browder / Jen Easterly /
Zack Kopplin / Laura Shin / Dmitri Alperovitch / Tom Keatinge
Catherine Belton / Nazanin Boniadi / Chris Krebs /
Kevin Hall / Farnaz Fassihi / Kevin Collier / Patrick Howell O’Neill /
Michael McFaul / Jonathan Schanzer / Catalin Cimpanu /
Liza Lin / Enes Kanter FREEDOM / Bianna Golodryga

RESOURCES

Financial Action Task Force /
Egmont Group /
Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project /
International Consortium of Investigative Journalists /
Money Laundering Watch/
C4ADS /
Combating Terrorism Center /
Royal United Services Institute /

PODCASTS

🎙️ Conversation with an Exiled Venezuelan Opposition Leader Lawfare

🎙️ Hezbollah’s Secret Missile Cities, Russia Advances In Ukraine, & Hamas Chief Fears For Life President’s Daily Brief

🎙️ Fox News, defamation, and our new information reality Click Here

🎙️ Deep Cover: George Santos Pushkin

🎙️ Conversation with Former FATF President RUSI

🎙 ️The problem with the Nigerian economy has nothing to do with crypto Click Here

🎙 ️Crypto ATMs, a Senator Convicted, AUSTRAC Report, Timeshare Fraud, etc. AML Conversations

🎙 ️Sanctions and Russia’s Nuclear Diplomacy RUSI

🎙 ️Partnering with terrorists to fight terrorists Generation Jihad 

🎙 ️Allen Stanford: The Lord of the Lies Scamfluencers

IN OTHER NEWS

COMPLIANCE TOOLBOX

🔑 Cryptocurrency Regulation Tracker Atlantic Council

🔑 COMTRADE: Using Trade Data to Uncover Fraud and Smuggling OCCRP

🔑 2022 Rule of Law Index World Justice Project

🔑 Global Organized Crime Index Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime

🔑 Anti-Corruption Helpdesk Transparency International

🔑 Flight Intelligence for Investigators Icarus Flights, C4ADS

🔑 Global Legislative Map: Violent Extremist and Terrorist-Related Online Content Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism

🔑 Basel AML Index Map Basel Institute on Governance

🔑 Scorched Earth: Using NASA Fire Data to Monitor War Zones Bellingcat