Regulating the gatekeepers: Following the money behind organised crime

This article was originally written by BDO for the June 2026 edition of FIH Insights, published by Macquarie University’s Financial Integrity Hub.

In nearly two decades working in organised crime investigations and asset recovery, one theme has remained constant: organised crime’s greatest vulnerability is its money. Criminal enterprises exist to generate profit, and as long as that profit can be concealed and enjoyed, the underlying incentives remain intact.

In Australia, professional ‘gatekeepers’, including lawyers, accountants, real estate agents, and other advisers, have helped criminals hide and move illicit wealth with impunity. Operating beyond the scope of anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing (AML/CTF) obligations, these professionals have leveraged a regulatory gap, allowing criminals to obscure beneficial ownership, move funds through legitimate structures, and integrate illicit wealth into the financial system. This is not a minor loophole; it is a chasm in our defences.

From an investigative perspective, this gap not only complicated prosecutions but also shifted the balance of power between criminals and the state. When professional expertise is used to shield illicit wealth, even the most sophisticated investigative efforts can be delayed, diluted, or ultimately undermined.

Critically, the professional enablers are rarely naive or ignorant. They are often brazen opportunists who know exactly what they are doing. Commanding high fees, some knowingly collude with criminals or turn a deliberate blind eye, sacrificing ethics for profit. A lack of regulatory clarity has reinforced the perception that risk sits with their clients, not with themselves. Until recently, many have assumed, often correctly, that enforcement attention would focus on principal offenders rather than the those enabling them. In the absence of AML/CTF obligations, this dynamic has fostered a shadow service economy that supports and sustains the growth of illicit enterprises.

The hidden power of professional facilitation

The role of professional enablers in shielding and enabling illicit wealth is not abstract, it plays out in real investigations. This dynamic was clearly demonstrated in a case that Katie Bourne and Huey Lam both worked on, where a long-running money laundering and tax evasion investigation revealed just how effectively a single facilitator can enable and sustain complex criminal activity over time. The principal architect built a clandestine business that enabled dozens of clients to evade taxes and launder undeclared income, in exchange for a commission on the funds processed. The scheme operated over many years and depended on a professional facilitator: an accountant who established shell companies with no legitimate commercial purpose, used to obscure beneficial ownership, conceal the source of funds, create a veneer of legitimacy for financial flows, and coordinate efforts to stay ahead of regulatory and law enforcement scrutiny.

These tactics allowed wealth to be moved and concealed at a pace that outstripped conventional tax enforcement processes, creating a sustained cat-and-mouse dynamic that proved difficult to disrupt using traditional tools alone. It ultimately took a full-scale joint law enforcement operation, including forensic asset tracing, to untangle the web and restrain proceeds. By that time, however, much of the profit generated had already been dissipated or reinvested into assets including, gold bullion or property.

This case reinforced a sobering reality: the longer criminals can obscure their financial footprints, the harder it becomes for authorities to restrain and recover illicit profits. From a policy perspective, this is significant. Targeting individual criminal enterprises may disrupt specific operations, but addressing the facilitation layer has the potential to generate broader systemic impact.

Does regulating gatekeepers meaningfully reduce global AML/CTF risk?

Regulating professional services will not eliminate criminal misuse, but it introduces friction that makes reliance on professional facilitation significantly harder to sustain.

The case described illustrates why that distinction matters. The accountant at the centre of the scheme operated in an environment where there was no obligation to interrogate who the real client was, why complex structures were required, or whether the movement of funds aligned with any legitimate economic purpose. Their business model depended on speed, opacity, and the absence of scrutiny.

Had customer due diligence and ongoing risk assessment obligations applied at the time, that model would have been far more difficult to maintain. Phoney trusts and companies, along with complex transactions lacking any economic rationale would have required explanation. Implausible source‑of‑funds narratives would have needed to be documented or rejected. At the very least, the accountant would have been forced to reassess whether the commercial upside justified the regulatory and reputational exposure.

Shifting the operating environment

The AML/CTF Tranche 2 implementation changes mark a structural shift to the dynamic. Criminals can no longer assume their lawyer, accountant, or fixer can quietly manage illicit activity behind closed doors. Regulators and law enforcement, armed with greater visibility into these sectors, will have stronger grounds and better data to act when facilitators cross the line.

Even modest levels of scrutiny can disrupt criminal methodologies that rely on speed, secrecy, and professional complicity. Transactions that would previously proceed without question may now be delayed, interrogated, or abandoned altogether. Structures designed to obscure ownership may become more difficult to establish and maintain.

In response, firms begin to reassess the clients and engagements they are prepared to accept. Risk appetite narrows, high‑risk work becomes commercially unattractive, not because it is expressly prohibited, but because it carries scrutiny, documentation and accountability that many facilitation models cannot withstand. As a result, criminal clients encounter fewer willing intermediaries, higher costs, slower execution, and a significantly increased likelihood of exposure.

AUSTRAC’s Money Laundering Update 2026 reinforces why this shift is important. It highlights that core money‑laundering channels are becoming more complex and interconnected, with professional facilitation remaining an enduring vulnerability rather than a legacy risk, one that is further amplified by technology. The introduction of AML/CTF obligations removes critical blind spots that have historically allowed facilitators to operate undetected.

Closing the gaps

These reforms do not close every door, but it will close enough to materially alter the operating environment. From both investigative and asset confiscation perspectives, that shift is meaningful. It weakens the scaffolding that allows criminal wealth to be normalised within the legitimate economy, forces illicit activity into less efficient and more detectable channels, and increases the likelihood that proceeds can be identified, restrained and ultimately removed.

Delays and extra scrutiny can disrupt a criminal operation’s cash flow, buying investigators valuable time to detect patterns and trace assets before they are dissipated.

Regulating the gatekeepers is not a silver bullet. However, by following the money into the professional environments where it has historically been safest, and by forcing facilitators to confront their own risk exposure, it targets the systems that allow financial crime to persist. In that sense, it represents one of the most consequential structural reforms in the global AML/CTF landscape.

How BDO can help

BDO is a trusted adviser to clients and provides forensic services support, including preventative financial crime risk management, across a broad range of sectors. Our forensic services team conduct AML/CTF independent reviews and proactive financial crime risk assessments for highly regulated institutions to ensure they comply with their independent review requirements under the AML/CTF Act. If you would like to learn more about our services or need support embedding AML best practice across your organisation, contact us today.