Introduction

7.1 As the UK’s 2017 national risk assessment recognises, tackling financial activity and making greater use of financial intelligence is a major priority for law enforcement in the fight against domestic and global terrorism. Between October 2014 and September 2015, just 1,899 of the 381,882 suspicious activity reports (SARs) received by the National Crime Agency (NCA) were linked to terrorism.1 This is perhaps because large-scale, coordinated terrorist financing is not the norm in the UK. Instead, financial support of terrorism is varied and typically low-level,2 making it all the more difficult to detect. The movement of funds may be directed at supporting a small group planning on joining terrorist groups abroad. Recent experiences also show they may be directed at supporting a low-cost unsophisticated domestic attack perpetrated by just one or two individuals.