3 Measures against money laundering

The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) was established in 1989 in response to a declaration made at a summit. The FATF originally aimed to make recommendations concerning measures that the respective member countries should take, including criminalizing money laundering related to drug offenses, obliging financial institutions to identify customers and report suspicious transactions to the competent authorities, securing and confiscating illegal proceeds, and strengthening international cooperation, etc. It is currently also putting effort into measures against money laundering involving serious offences in general and measures against terrorist financing. The FATF Recommendations (4th revised edition) that were adopted in February 2012 integrated/rationalized the conventional 40 Recommendations (adopted in 1990; revised in 1996 and 2003) and Nine Special Recommendations on Terrorist Financing (adopted in 2001; revised in 2004) while requiring prioritization of measures in areas at risk of being hotbeds of money laundering or terrorist financing, including freezing assets of those involved in the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and improving transparency regarding juridical persons and trust, etc.

In Japan, as a FATF member nation, the National Public Safety Commission has been actively participating in international cooperation in tackling money laundering and terrorist financing by providing information on suspicious transactions to the relevant foreign agencies in accordance with the Criminal Proceeds Transfer Prevention Act.