How Do People Disappear?

Over the past several years newspaper headlines and television news media have been inundated with stories of investment advisors who have conned their clients out of millions of dollars and have disappeared seemingly into thin air. Recently, I've been asked to conduct radio and television interviews, and the theme was always the same, "How do people just disappear?" This seemingly new phenomenon is not a new occurrence at all, in fact, it has been around since the creation of the monetary system. It seems that the issues normally found in Hollywood movies have now taken center stage directly affecting many unsuspecting victims whose life savings are lost to professional conmen.

In this article, I will attempt to explain the process of disappearing in brief, without going into too much detail for obvious reasons.

So, How Do People Disappear?
The process for successfully disappearing under the radar is one that must be methodical and detail-oriented, often involving months and even years of psychological and logistical planning. Like a recipe, leaving out any of the key ingredients, will leave nothing but a bad taste in your mouth.

Psychological Preparation
The psychological preparation is much more difficult than the logistical aspect. A decision must be made that once the disappearing act is put into effect he (to simplify matters we will use the name Joseph Smith as our fictional magician) can never look back. He must abandon his old life and identity and start his new one. Joseph Smith the shammed investment advisor will disappear into the mist and re-emerge as Jonathan Green the wealthy entrepreneur. This decision may be easy for some and difficult for others. Mr. Smith has to also come to grips with the fact that he can never return home again. He can never call his friends and family, especially not on birthdays, anniversaries or holidays. Never attend his daughter's wedding or be there for the birth of his grandchildren. Breaking any one of these rules will almost certainly lead to his arrest.

Logistical Preparation
If Mr. Smith has accepted the psychological challenges, then he can move on to prepare logistically to ensure he can live the remainder of his days on the stolen money.
Since no one will be suspecting Mr. Smith of any criminal activity prior to his disappearance he has plenty of time to funnel money into offshore accounts most likely to countries that have not signed the MLAT (mutual legal assistance treaty) with his home country. MLAT is an agreement between two foreign countries for the purpose of gathering and exchanging information in an effort to enforce criminal laws.

A Name By Any Other…
As his victim's money is being wired outside the country Joseph realizes that to increase his chances of a successful getaway, creating a new existence for himself is a must. How does one change their identity without attracting attention?

1. The Graveyard Robber- Many identity thieves steal their new identities from graveyards by finding a deceased person having approximately the same year of birth as them but usually having died before the age of sixteen. We won't go any further on this one.

2. The Government Employee/Entrepreneur- In many developing countries where the average daily salary cannot support a family, it isn't difficult to find a government employee who for a few thousand dollars, sometimes less, will create official documents for a new identity.

3. Passport Dealers - The stolen or phony passport business is a huge industry. For a few thousand dollars one can purchase a passport in almost any name.

D-Day
It's 7:30 am on a Tuesday and Joseph has breakfast with his wife as he normally does. He lets her know that he won't be home for supper due to his weekly Tuesday night meetings. As he gets in his BMW he calls the office letting his secretary know that he will be meeting with clients all day outside the office. Instead of driving to his non-existent meetings he continues on to the airport and gets on a flight to Mexico City. Once he arrives in Mexico he discards his cell phone, credit cards, passport and any other documents linking him to his old identity. He can never use them again. He goes to his airport locker picks up his new Jonathan Green identity, buys a two-way ticket (not to arouse suspicion), with cash and travels to Belize that does not have a MLAT agreement with his home country. Upon his arrival he visits the bank where he funneled a portion of the money and makes a withdrawal. In the course of a business day he has made his escape and no one is the least bit suspicious. He has days before the police will begin looking for him. By that time Jonathan Green could be in his 5th country using several different identities. All the authorities have is that he took a flight to Mexico and disappeared.

How Are They Caught?
Only a small percentage of those who disappear and that are wanted by the authorities ever disappear for good. More and more countries are quickly moving towards becoming a cashless society which means that more and more transactions can be traced which makes disappearing a lot more challenging, but certainly not impossible.

The most common reason for getting caught is the breaking of one or more of the aforementioned rules. One is all it takes.

After nearly a year, Joseph is living in paradise off his stolen millions, which have bought him a beautiful beachfront home equipped with his very own cook and maid. He enjoys his days on his private white sandy beach and warm turquoise water. Joseph's feeling pretty untouchable at this point thinking, if they haven't caught him yet they never will. Missing his wife he decides that one phone call back home to invite his wife to meet him in Cancun for a week to "explain" everything wouldn't hurt. The authorities back home, keeping track of all phone calls made to his wife's phone, noticed a phone call from Central America and that the very next day his wife booked one ticket to beautiful Cancun, Mexico. Authorities setup surveillance on his wife and guess what happened next?

About the Author

John Farinaccio has over 17 years experience in investigations and intelligence gathering. In 1999 he founded The Canadian Private Investigators' Resource Centre (C.P.I.R.C.), and currently serves as the director of the largest Investigators' Network in Canada. John has both managed and lead investigation & undercover surveillance teams, and has spearheaded the development of Advance Reconnaissance Teams for international Protection Details; many in hostile areas of operations.

Aside from being an instructor in Investigation, Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism subjects, he is also a certified instructor in Monadnock PR-24 Police Baton, Monadnock Expandable Police Baton (MEB), Monadnock Defensive Tactics System (MDTS), Quick Stick Police Baton, amongst many others.

John has been called on by the media conducting interviews as an expert in the field of investigations.

Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/johnfarinaccio

Spies in cyberspace a growing threat to Canada: CSIS annual report

OTTAWA — Cyberattacks waged via the Internet are the fastest growing form of espionage, Canada's spy agency says.

The Canadian Security Intelligence Service also warns that the energy, financial and telecommunications sectors are becoming increasingly vulnerable to attack.

In its annual public report, CSIS says it investigated threats against critical systems last year by foreign countries, terrorists and hackers.

Internet-based tools and techniques offer a secure and low-risk means of conducting espionage, the spy service says.

"Increasingly, cyber-related tools and techniques have been added to the methods utilized by hostile actors to attack public- and private-sector systems," says the report tabled Monday in Parliament.

"CSIS focuses its investigations on politically motivated threats or incidents where the integrity, confidentiality or availability of the critical information infrastructure is affected."

Internet access at the Treasury Board and Finance departments was cut off in January after what officials called "an unauthorized attempt" to break into their networks.

A routine assessment of both departments last year revealed they had not been following all of the government's information technology security requirements.

CSIS is aware that certain foreign agencies are conducting intelligence operations within Canada, the service's director, Dick Fadden, says in a foreword to the report released Monday.

The spy agency did not respond to a request to interview him.

In a speech last year, Fadden said state-sponsored espionage against Canada was being conducted at levels equal to or greater than during the Cold War.

Canada is attractive to foreign spies because it's an innovative leader in areas such as agriculture, biotechnology, communications, mining and the aerospace industry, he said.

"Certainly, China has often been cited in media reports as an example of a country that engages in such activity but it would not be exclusive to that country. Just as the Internet is global, so is the cyber threat," Fadden said.

Attackers target computer systems to acquire technology, intellectual property, military strategy and commercial or weapons-related information, as well as details of national strategies on a variety of domestic and foreign issues, the CSIS annual report says.

It cites public information describing the use of botnets — networks of compromised machines that can be purchased or rented by potential attackers — as well as rogue emails, Twitter and other social networking services to launch attacks.

"Some governments around the world have complained openly of cyberattacks directed against their public and private sectors, with several stating that government-backed hackers were the perpetrators.

"CSIS is aware that this cyber-based variant is the fastest growing form of espionage, that the threat of cyberattacks is one of the most complicated issues affecting the public and private sectors and that attacks on the latter have grown substantially and are becoming more complex and difficult to detect."

The report notes that terrorists and other extremists use online resources — including email, chat rooms, instant messaging, blogs and video-sharing sites — to plan, co-ordinate and execute operations.

"The cyber-related capabilities of various extremist groups have been publicly described as limited at present, but their abilities are developing and evolving," the report says.

"This was not a concern in the early days of CSIS as there was no broad, worldwide use of the Internet to speak of. Communication between individuals and groups that were targets or persons of interests was much more difficult than it is today and much easier for organizations such as ours to track."

Terrorism, primarily Islamist extremist violence, remains the greatest threat to the safety and security of the West, including Canadians, adds the report.

By Jim Bronskill, The Canadian Press