AUSTRAC is expanding its Fintel Alliance model after working to successfully detect serious criminal activity such as fraud, tax evasion, and illegal gambling via shared data analytics and teamwork.
One of the most notable cases in recent times includes AUSTRAC obtaining data on cash deposits below $10,000 from the four largest banks in Australia. AUSTRAC, along with financial crime teams, conducted an extensive investigation of the combined data that showed coordinated transactions connected to organized crime, i.e. money laundering.
Moreover, the Australian regulator also noticed an increase in “scrambling” activity, which, in layman’s terms, is a practice that involves illegal online gambling advertisements on social media channels. These platforms, which often impersonate legal gaming operators, are created to redirect consumers to illegal casino websites.
Members of the Fintech Alliance have raised further concerns that this seriously impacts vulnerable groups in Australia, especially in the Aboriginal communities.
Brendan Thomas, Chief Executive Officer of AUSTRAC, commented on the operation and said that they’ve detected a series of legal breaches:
Using more than 50 million data points from multiple banks, analysts were able to detect previously unseen criminal networks in a matter of days.
Fintel Alliance was established in 2017 and is a public-private initiative that includes gambling operators, major banks, law enforcement agencies, and remittance services to enable real-time data sharing in order to find financial crime patterns that are usually missed via standard channels.
One of the major contributors to the success of the operation was the alerts issued by Fintel Alliance regarding micro-laundering, an illegal practice where illegal money is blended together with legitimate transactions via low-value digital transactions.
The extension of Fintel Alliance with AUSTRAC comes right after the launch of the “Use It or Lose It” campaign, which was launched in April 2025 for the purpose of targeting cryptocurrency exchanges with low activity. Additionally, the Australian regulator is on the fast track to introduce a register for cryptocurrency operators as part of a broader strategy to boost transparency and integrity.
