Financial Action Task Force issues report on terrorist financing through social media and says under 30% of jurisdictions assess the risk

The Financial Action Task Force has published a report on how social media, instant messaging applications and streaming platforms are being misused to finance terrorist activity, highlighting a shift from their traditional role as communications tools toward digital ecosystems that can embed payments, virtual assets and creator monetisation. The publication sets out detection and disruption recommendations for countries, centered on stronger public-private cooperation, better information sharing, clearer regulatory boundaries, stronger inter-agency coordination and improved links between financial and digital intelligence. The report identifies typologies including fraudulent humanitarian and charitable crowdfunding, use of livestreaming and tipping features, virtual asset fundraising through QR codes and rotating wallets, coded language and ephemeral content to evade detection, and the use of commercial activity to disguise terrorist financing. FATF said fewer than 30% of reporting jurisdictions currently cover these risks in their national risk assessments. It also stressed that while SMSPs are not currently a sector directly subject to anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism obligations under the FATF Standards, some activities conducted through or enabled by these platforms may already fall within the scope of existing regulated sectors, including where a platform or associated provider functions as a financial institution or virtual asset service provider.