Fintrac crunches data in fentanyl fight

Canada’s anti-money laundering agency is helping fight the scourge of fentanyl by tracing the illicit movement of funds tied to the deadly drug.

Barry MacKillop, interim director of the federal Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre, says the agency has passed intelligence about the dangerous opioid to lawenforcement partners.

Just this week, the financial data-crunching agency, known as Fintrac, was cited for its role in uncovering a Calgary-based trafficking network, leading to the seizure of more than $4-million worth of drugs, including fentanyl.

The agency tries to pinpoint cash linked to money laundering and terrorism by sifting through tens of millions of pieces of information annually from banks, insurance companies, securities dealers, money service businesses, real estate brokers, casinos and others.

Fintrac’s annual report, tabled in Parliament on Thursday, says the agency made 2,015 disclosures of intelligence in 2016-17 to partners including Canada’s spy agency, the RCMP and other police services — up from 1,655 the year before.

Of the latest disclosures, 1,366 were related to money laundering, 462 involved terrorism and threats to national security, and 187 involved all of these.

Fintrac has been working for months with police and the many institutions that supply reports about suspicious dealings to come up with common signs of fentanyl trafficking.