The U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has launched a joint initiative with its global counterparts to combat transnational tax crime and money laundering.
The Joint Chiefs of Global Tax Enforcement, or J5, has brought together the leaders of tax enforcement authorities from Australia, Canada, the Netherlands, the U.K. and the U.S. The participating authorities include the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission (ACIC) and Australian Taxation Office (ATO), the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA), the Fiscale Inlichtingen- en Opsporingsdienst (FIOD), HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC), and Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI).
“We cannot continue to operate in the same ways we have in the past, siloing our information from the rest of the world while organized criminals and tax cheats manipulate the system and exploit vulnerabilities for their personal gain. The J5 aims to break down those walls, build upon individual best practices, and become an operational group that is forward-thinking and can pressurize the global criminal community in ways we could not achieve on our own,” Don Fort, Chief of IRS-CI, said in a statement.
The initiative has been launched in response to the OECD’s call to action for countries to ramp up efforts to tackle the enablers of tax crime. The J5 works closely with the OECD and other countries and organisations where appropriate.
The entities will work together to gather information, share intelligence, conduct operations and try to enhance the capacity of tax crime enforcement officials.
“We will work together to investigate those who enable transnational tax crime and money laundering and those who benefit from it. We will also collaborate internationally to reduce the growing threat to tax administrations posed by cryptocurrencies and cybercrime and to make the most of data and technology,” according to the details provided on the IRS website.
The group held its first meeting last week in which it developed plans and identified opportunities to pursue cyber-criminals and enablers of transnational tax crimes. Further updates on the initiative are expected to be revealed in late 2018.
