Corruption Ledger

An anonymous whistleblower leaked a scandalous trove of banking data to a German Newspaper. 48 media companies from all over the world analyzed the contents of the Suisse Secrets data leak and the findings show that instead of conducting the required due diligence in screening potential clients, Credit Suisse accepted clients who are known to be “corrupt autocrats, suspected war criminals, human traffickers, drug dealers and other criminals.”1

A human trafficker convicted in the Philippines and an Egyptian murderer are also included in the data, as are cardinals allegedly involved in shady dealings and the former Siemens manager Eduard Seidel, who was convicted of bribery in 2008.

Gizmodo reached out to several of the people who are listed as top donors, asking them to confirm their donations, including a person with the name Thomas Siebel who donated $90,000, according to the leaked data. (Thomas Siebel is the name of an American software billionaire.)
One donor listed on the data set confirmed that he donated to the campaign. Brad Howland, who was listed as giving US$75,000 said in a written statement Monday that he supports the convoy. Howland is president of Easy-Kleen Pressure Systems in Sussex Corner, N.B. “We are thankful to be blessed enough to support their efforts to do what they have to do in a peaceful way until the government removes the mandates to restore all our freedom as pre-COVID,” he said.

Indonesian Paper and Palm Oil Tycoon Secretly Bought Historic Munich Building for 350 Million Euros.
Tanoto’s companies have been accused of causing widespread deforestation in Indonesia, human rights abuses, and a plethora of questionable profit-shifting practices that have deprived Indonesia of hundreds of millions in tax revenues.
Tanoto’s son, Andre, also bought an iconic building in Düsseldorf for a little under 50 million euros at around the same time, using a similar secret Luxembourg corporate structure.

INVESTAR, SFGP and other Montreal Real Estate Companies related to Serafino Oliverio, AKA Sergio Lopez, “considered by police to be the leader of the Montreal Mafia.”

The human rights lawyer, who was arrested on 8 September, was a member of the Hong Kong Alliance, an advocacy group which organized an annual candlelight vigil marking the 1989 protests in Tiananmen Square.

Several other activists have been similarly arrested and charged under the National Security Law.

The law came into force at the end of June last year, giving Chinese central authorities greater power and control over all aspects of life in Hong Kong.

“Terrorism and sedition charges are being improperly used to stifle the exercise of fundamental rights, which are protected under international law, including freedom of expression and opinion, freedom of peaceful assembly and the right to participate in public affairs”, the Special Rapporteurs said, urging authorities to refrain from the using the National Security Law and to reconsider its application.

Named: Tom Barrack, Paul Manafort, George Papadopoulos, Rick Gates, Michael Flynn, Michael Cohen, Steve Bannon, Roger Stone, Donald Trump

On 10 June 2021, the National People’s Congress Standing Committee of the People’s Republic of China passed the Law of the PRC on Countering Foreign Sanctions (the “Anti-Sanctions Law”). The Anti-Sanctions Law establishes a legal regime for the protection of Chinese individuals and entities from what are deemed to be discriminatory foreign sanctions and for implementing countermeasures against such sanctions. Although…

On 16 March 2021 the UK published its Integrated Review of Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy titled “Global Britain in a competitive age”, which sets out the UK government’s overarching national security and international policy objectives through to 2025. The Review contains a number of references to the UK’s post Brexit sanctions regime and places the UK’s autonomous sanctions…

Investigations, Probes

The ACLU published thousands of pages of previously unreleased records showing that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) are sidestepping the constitutional right against unreasonable government search and seizure.  DHS has been buying access to and using large volumes of cell phone location information that has been “quietly extracted from smartphone apps” of U.S. citizens and others — using their…

Ukrainians’ distrust of the courts is higher than of any other government body. The Kyiv District Administrative Court has become the epitome of injustice and corruption in Ukraine.

Today, the Department of Justice announced a global resolution of its criminal and civil investigations into the opioid manufacturer Purdue Pharma LP (Purdue), and a civil resolution of its civil investigation into individual shareholders from the Sackler family.  The resolutions with Purdue are subject to the approval of the bankruptcy court. “The abuse and diversion of prescription opioids has contributed…

Ukrainian citizens trust the Armed Forces of Ukraine the most (65% of respondents), followed by the church (63%) and volunteer organisations (63%). These are the results of research conducted by the Razumkov Center’s sociological service together with the Ilko Kucheriv.“Democratic Initiatives” Foundation. Within the research framework, 2,022 respondents, aged 18 and over, were interviewed in all regions of Ukraine (except…

On Monday, the Intercept published a classified internal NSA document noting that Russian military intelligence mounted an operation to hack at least one US voting software supplier—which provided software related to voter registration files—in the months prior to last year’s presidential contest. It has previously been reported that Russia attempted to hack into voter registration systems, but this NSA document provides details of how one such operation occurred.

According to the Intercept:

The top-secret National Security Agency document, which was provided anonymously to The Intercept and independently authenticated, analyzes intelligence very recently acquired by the agency about a months-long Russian intelligence cyber effort against elements of the US election and voting infrastructure. The report, dated May 5, 2017, is the most detailed US government account of Russian interference in the election that has yet come to light.

While the document provides a rare window into the NSA’s understanding of the mechanics of Russian hacking, it does not show the underlying “raw” intelligence on which the analysis is based. A US intelligence officer who declined to be identified cautioned against drawing too big a conclusion from the document because a single analysis is not necessarily definitive.

The report indicates that Russian hacking may have penetrated further into US voting systems than was previously understood. It states unequivocally in its summary statement that it was Russian military intelligence, specifically the Russian General Staff Main Intelligence Directorate, or GRU, that conducted the cyber attacks described in the document:

Russian General Staff Main Intelligence Directorate actors … executed cyber espionage operations against a named U.S. company in August 2016, evidently to obtain information on elections-related software and hardware solutions. … The actors likely used data obtained from that operation to … launch a voter registration-themed spear-phishing campaign targeting U.S. local government organizations.

Go read the whole thing.