The Jihad Express –> Gaziantep Turkey still ISIS’ conduit city of choice

By Christine Duhaime | March 8th, 2015

Jihad Express

Gaziantep, Turkey appears to have emerged as a city of choice for terrorist financing and human trafficking for the Islamic State (“ISIS“) in the past twelve months.

Gaziantep is a city close to the Syrian border and is considered one of the key “porous” border towns, where people and goods illegally sold or shipped to ISIS from the Middle East or the West, can cross the Turkey – Syrian border easily. It is located 60 miles from Aleppo, Syria, a city largely under the control of ISIS. The flight from Istanbul to Gaziantep is known as “jihad express.” Reyhanli, a Turkish border town, is also a conduit town.

Economic Centre 

Gaziantep is known as “ISIS International” in reference to it being an ISIS hub where the group collects new recruits arriving from other countries to take them across the border, and conducts a large part of its commercial activities.  In the last two months, Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization estimated that 3,000 foreign fighters joined ISIS traveling through Gaziantep and its importance as a town economically supported by terrorist commerce is not disputed.

US Indictment

Last month, the US Department of Justice indicted six foreign nationals for terrorist financing in connection with al Qaeda and ISIS for, inter alia, allegedly using money services businesses to send money to Gaziantep where it was collected by ISIS affiliated agents to fund their activities. The Indictment also says that army-related goods were shipped from the US to ISIS via Gaziantep. A few months earlier, an organization in Egypt circulated an infographic on Twitter showing how young teenage girls from the UK are routed to ISIS through Gaziantep and how funds to pay for their travel is facilitated by a money services business in Gaziantep that accepts payments from ISIS to remit funds to the UK for teenage girls to defect to Syria.

Bethnal Green Academy

In fact, the three British brides who recently joined ISIS were filmed in Gaziantep getting into a car before crossing the border to Syria. In the video, you can see that the girls have expensive Louis Vuitton luggage. Their ISIS handler gives them new Syrian passports, which speaks to the control ISIS has over official Syrian documentation that UK nationals can be given Syrian passports in Turkey and it also speaks to the pre-planning involved for ISIS operatives to have secured their photos in passport format and issued passports for the girls purportedly from the Syrian government. The smuggling route through Gaziantep is well-organized. In the video, the ISIS handler tells the girls that there are lots of “bullets” in Gaziantep and is heard saying that Gaziantep is the “better border.”

Two Bitcoin stories hit the news related to ISIS and terrorist financing allegations

By Christine Duhaime | March 5th, 2015

Bitcoin hits the news related to ISIS

There were two Bitcoin stories today in the US media with an ISIS connection, raising alarm bells regarding the potential use of digital currencies for terrorist financing.

The first story was that a teenager in Virginia had been arrested by the FBI for allegedly facilitating a person to travel to Syria to join the Islamic State.  According to BuzzFeed.com, the teenager wrote for a Bitcoin newspaper called “CoinBrief” and covered virtual currency news developments. The teenager apparently also operated a Bitcoin exchange that sold Bitcoin.

His sympathetic leanings in respect of ISIS may have been predicted – in 2013, according to BuzzFeed, the teenager wrote an article lauding the practice of human slavery as a “peaceful” way of integrating “belligerent” women and children into society as opposed to “killing them”, whereby (according to the teenager], non-Muslims would learn to accept Muslim culture.

Bitcoin via Twitter Tips

The second story is surreal and I only learned of it from a chief compliance office at a major US bank, a fact that should indicate the concern among global banks over how companies in the Bitcoin space continue to miss cues on serious financial crime concerns.

This story involves the use of a Bitcoin tipping service that was allegedly used for terrorist financing. A person allegedly used the tipping service to send $1 via Twitter to another person whom the sender believed was a member of ISIS.  According to the story, it appears that the sender deliberately and knowingly completed a financial transaction over the Internet to engage in terrorist financing to benefit ISIS as a test. Later, the sender is alleged to have commented that he was not yet “in jail.”

The article then goes on to quote a spokesperson from the tipping company commenting about freedom of speech, the relevance in law of which is unclear. Sending Bitcoin via Twitter, regardless of the mechanism, is not an exercise of freedom of speech – it is a financial transaction.

Europol says organized crime is quickly changing to virtual methods

By Christine Duhaime | March 4th, 2015

In a report released yesterday on serious organized crime called “Exploring Tomorrow’s Organized Crime” (the “Report“), Europol found that organized crime is now becoming a virtual activity over the Internet and as a result, transnational criminal organizations (“TCO“) are migrating towards virtual payment methods to conduct commercial affairs, including digital payments. According to Europol, the move to digital finance eliminates face-to-face interactions (and reduces identity risks for organized criminals), allowing anonymous exchange of financial resources.

Key facts from the Report are as follows:

  1. Innovation will increasingly allow TCOs to commit crimes anonymously.
  2. Big data will be exploited by TCOs to extort people and businesses on an unprecedented scale, as well as to commit fraud using stolen personal information. The more people provide personal data to more and more organizations, the more they become exposed to criminality.
  3. The “rich are getting richer” problem, wealth disparity, in the EU is making people more readily accept TCO criminal activities that target the wealthy if the crimes deprive the rich of their wealth.
  4. TCOs continue to infiltrate natural resources all over the world as agents (wind farm projects, natural gas, solar energy, etc.). They continue to prefer the green energy sector and have successfully infiltrated those sectors.
  5. Digital currencies, such as Bitcoin, will facilitate money laundering and alleviate the need for criminal infrastructure. The anonymous nature of digital currencies and their rapid transferability make them ideal for money laundering, especially if used with illegal forms of online gambling.
  6. Digital currencies like Bitcoin have become the currency of choice for internet-facilitated crime.
  7. The proliferation of digital currencies will allow an entire criminal economy to flourish with little possibility of law enforcement intervention.
  8. With respect to terrorism, anonymous marketplaces on the Internet for goods and services that are illegal carry the risk of convergence of terrorism and organized crime.
  9. The return of terrorist defectors who are radicalized will join the TCO underworld and drive some of its activities.
  10. Part of the solution for law enforcement will have to be public-private partnerships to get on top of TCOs and their activities.

Counter-Terrorist Financing Presentation in Toronto

By Christine Duhaime | February 13th, 2015

With the Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists, we’re organizing a special presentation on “Terrorist Financing Concerns & Risks in Ontario for the Financial Services Sector” on February 24, 2015, in Toronto. The presentation will be given by the OPP’s Deputy Commissioner, Scott Tod, and Deputy Director of FINTRAC, Barry MacKillop, and is sponsored by Thomson Reuters.

It is a great step in making Canada a leader in counter-terrorist financing initiatives. You can contact Christine Duhaime to register for the event. Space is limited.

Quebec moves to regulate digital currency businesses

By Christine Duhaime | February 13th, 2015

Are Bitcoin Exchanges MSBs?

The Québec Government’s Authorité des Marchés Financiers (the “AMF“) today issued a News Release announcing that businesses that operate digital currency ATMs and “platforms for trading virtual currencies” must be licensed by the AMF as money services businesses (“MSB“) pursuant to the provincial Money Services Business Act (the “Act“). It also issued a Policy Statement to accompany the Act to reflect how “platforms for trading virtual currencies” and virtual currency ATMs will be governed. Generally, in law policies are non-binding.

Apart from these ATMs in Québec, it is unclear what else in respect of digital currency businesses need to be licensed.

The Policy Statement does it define what a “platform for trading virtual currencies” is and it is not obvious whether that means digital currency exchanges, or a website, or neither, or both, or something else entirely.

The Policy defines “currency exchange” as the exchanging of currency or legal tender money for another, based on an exchange rate. Digital currencies are not currency or legal tender so “platforms for trading virtual currencies” are not currency exchanges but there are no other definitions that could possibly be relevant in the Policy Statement.

With respect to ATMs, the Policy Statement says that digital currency ATMs are considered ATMs for the purposes of the Act only when they sell digital currencies for cash and provided there is no human intervention in the transaction. If an ATM transaction has human intervention, it is not a MSB and licensing is not required. Presumably then, a Bitcoin company could legally avoid licensing in Québec with an ATM by ensuring human intervention in the transaction. It is not known what is meant by human intervention.

Under the Policy Statement, customers of digital currency ATMs do not have to be identified before the MSB provides serves to them.

The Act requires that MSBs be investigated by the provincial police and found suitable to operate the business. In addition to a criminal background check, the police will determine the moral character of the person. MSBs must disclose and obtain security clearances for, associates of the business and all of its lenders.

MSBs must also disclose the names of all of its employees, as well as its directors and officers and their personal information, and file a business plan and financial statements.

A business that has any connections to a person in organized crime will not be regulated to operate a MSB.

The legal obligations imposed on MSBs pursuant to the Act are here.

Senate Hearings

The issue on what is required to be licensed in Québec in respect of “platforms for trading virtual currencies” was discussed when the AMF testified before the Senate Banking Committee on March 12, 2015.

When the AMF was asked about its licensing regime by the Senate Committee Chair, Irving Gerstein, the AMF testified: “At the moment, there is no regulation of virtual currencies, including Bitcoin…it’s a little ‘No Man’s Land’.” Senator Gerstein said that he understood that the AMF was going to require a permit for ATMs but he wanted to know whether the AMF was going to license  exchanges.

The AMF testified that if a digital currency exchange transacted Bitcoin that was not securities (in the securities law sense), it was outside the mandate of the AMF. If what was exchanged was securities, they said, the exchange would fall within the legislative framework.

The AMF’s specialist elaborated to testify that if a digital currency exchange transfers money directly from one person to another person, it is a transfer of funds, ergo a MSB and the Act applies. A “platform”, the AMF testified, means a system like PayPal except with Bitcoin. If, the AMF testified, there is a transfer of currency to purchase (or sell) Bitcoin, such a business must be registered as a MSB.

Senator Massicotte said that such a service, as described above, was an “exchange” and noted that the AFM had testified that such exchanges were not caught by the Act, to which the AMF only replied that the nuances were very important in the Act and that what they are regulating is MSBs.

At the end of the Senate hearings, it remains unclear just what services must be registered, apart from ATMs.

ISIS confirmed it is sending defectors back home to the West with instructions to commit terrorist acts

By Christine Duhaime | February 7th, 2015

ISIS  sending defectors back home

According to the popular website “Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently” written by people who oppose the Islamic State (“ISIS“) living in ar Raqqa, Syria, a town occupied by ISIS, ISIS is starting a campaign to send defectors back home to places like Canada, the UK, France and the US to carry out terrorist and suicide attacks.

The Syrian website operators translated the song that is heard in the video depicting the burning death of the Jordanian pilot Moaz al-Kasabeh, and spoke with members of ISIS in ar Raqqa about the song’s message. The website authors say that members of ISIS informed them that ISIS is starting a campaign to falsely state that foreign fighters who defected from their home countries (such as from countries like the US and Canada) and fought with them, have now defected from ISIS and are trying to return home. In reality, ISIS is funding them to return home to commit terrorist acts in the West.

The song says that ISIS’ battles will be “in their own home” referring to countries that are participating in attacks against ISIS. In the hi-tech video of the burning death of al-Kasabeh produced by ISIS, flags of the coalition countries are featured as the former Jordanian pilot describes their air strikes against ISIS, and the first country featured is –> Canada.

In order to ensure that the defectors are re-admissible in their home countries for immigration purposes, ISIS appears to have devised a plan to claim on social media that certain foreign men and women who joined them are now defectors. The ISIS members who talked to the Syrian website authors said that ISIS will “facilitate their entry into Western countries” by publishing rumors of defection [on social media].

Six Indicted in US for Funding ISIS Using Money Services Businesses that Routed Funds to Conduit Countries

By Christine Duhaime | February 7th, 2015

Terrorist Financing for ISIS using online Payment Processors and MSBs from US Routed to Turkey and Saudi Arabia

The USDOJ indicted six people this week for terrorist financing who are alleged to have used money services businesses to finance the Islamic State (“ISIS“) and to supply war-related goods to members of ISIS.

According to the Indictment, Abdullah Pazara, a former Bosnian foreign national, who became an American citizen, defected from the United States in May 2013, to join ISIS. In order to get to Syria, he first traveled to Croatia then Syria and began fighting for al Qaeda, then ISIS on the front lines.

On March 20, 2014, he allegedly confessed to having participated in an ISIS attack in which 11 people were killed and directed sympathizers in the US to watch videos evidencing ISIS’ reign of terror. He is charged with terrorist financing for having supplied money, monetary instruments and property to terrorist organizations, and for having supplied funding for the purposes of murdering and maiming people. He is also charged with conspiracy to kill people in a foreign country. Paraza is believed to be with ISIS or to have been killed.

The indictment also alleges that other defendants, including Siki Ramiz Hodzic and his wife, Sedina Unkic Hodzic, communicated on Facebook to post terrorist propaganda for al Qaeda, then ISIS, in support of their terrorist activities, extolling the so-called virtues of the activities of US foreign fighters such as Pazara in Syria against, inter alia, what they typically describe as kufars (a derogatory term used by terrorists to refer to people in the West).

During 2013, Mediha Salkicevic, Jasminka Ramic, and Armin Harcevic are alleged to have transferred money on multiple occasions through PayPal and Western Union to Hodzic’s bank account, which was used to buy army gear that Hodzic shipped to ISIS. In order to ship goods to ISIS, the natural route is to ship to Turkey.

Gaziantep, Turkey used as Conduit

The porous border between Turkey and Islamic State controlled areas means that persons, including defectors, and goods can travel easily back and forth. One of the towns used for ISIS shipments was Gaziantep, Turkey.

The Indictment says that funds paid to Hodzic in multiple transactions through PayPal and other sources during 2013 by  the defendants were sent to al Qaeda, then ISIS through Western Union and in order for ISIS beneficiaries to be able to receive the funds, were routed to a conduit country, namely Turkey, then transferred to the terrorist organizations. A Western Union agent in Gaziantep was the destination for the receipt of the funds.

Hodriz’ spouse, Sedina Hodzic, is also alleged to have funded ISIS in 2014 by sending funds using Western Union to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, another conduit state used by terrorist organizations for funding. The funds were transferred to Paraza for the use of ISIS.

The Indictment also alleges that Hodzic arranged for $600 to be sent to Bosnia using Western Union for a person to join ISIS, or for their traveling expenses to get to Syria. This seems to confirm the allegation by Yousaf al-Salafi, the alleged ISIS recruiter in Pakistan, that ISIS pays $600 per defector to recruitment agents that send foreign fighters to join them (as explained here), and that some of those transactions may have been routed through the US financial system, as al-Salafi alleged.

Why counter-terrorist financing matters in Canada

By Christine Duhaime | February 1st, 2015

In Canada, suppressing terrorism is an “uphill battle” (see: Commission of Inquiry Into the Investigation of the Bombing of Air India Flight 182), and a battle which Canada stands poised to lose ground over unless more is done to detect, deter and prosecute terrorist financing.

We have had numerous terrorist attacks planned and foiled, and to a much lesser extent, planned and carried out in Canada. Fortunately, our intelligence agencies have mostly been able to detect and prevent attacks but its just a matter of time before they miss one that will cause us substantial human and physical harm.

It is self-evident that terrorist acts require terrorist financing. Unfortunately, not a lot of financing is required because terrorist acts cost very little to carry out.

The direct costs of the bombing of Air India Flight 182 that claimed the lives of 280 Canadians has been estimated to cost $3,000; the cost of the 2004 Madrid train bombings that claimed 191 lives was estimated to cost €15,000. The Paris bombs in 1995, a few hundred dollars.

Thus, funds raised, even in relatively insignificant amounts, by the activities of those engaged in terrorist financing, can wreck incredible havoc on Canada with economic costs that range in the billions of dollars. In essence, what we know about terrorist financing is that is does not take a lot of money to accomplish a lot of damage.

We also know that charities and non-profits play an increasingly important role in terrorist financing (see: Commission of Inquiry Into the Investigation of the Bombing of Air India Flight 182).

The Commissioners who wrote the Commission of Inquiry into the Investigation of the Bombing of Air India Fight 182, after a multi-year study by learned people, found that financial institutions in Canada “have little incentive to monitor the flow of funds relating to terrorism.” It is surprising that the Commission received such testimony from financial institutions.

Be that as it may, it is true that financial institutions treat counter-terrorist financing law as if it is a branch of anti-money laundering law, and mistakenly use the same controls to detect it. They could not be more dissimilar.

Canadian financial institutions are managed and directed mostly by Canadians and there is ample incentive for them to be vigilant in respect of terrorist financing.

Terrorist acts have both direct and indirect costs on Canadians, and on our financial institutions.

Direct costs  include loss of human life and health and the loss of physical capital due to destruction of buildings and infrastructure. Indirect costs include the increased level of fear in the population, increased insurance and business costs.

There are also public costs, i.e., the expensive counterterrorist efforts by governments, such as airport security and border controls measures, monitoring the financial system and military operations, which drain resources from economically productive activities; and private costs bourn by the private sector, such as to comply with counter-terrorism laws and policies, reduced economic activity caused by greater costs to individuals and businesses through taxes, and non-monetary costs of the loss of civil liberties and other freedoms.

The purpose of detecting, preventing, acting lawfully against and prosecuting terrorist acts is to keep Canada and Canadians safe from those who would imperil our democratic freedom, core values and tolerant way of life, by harming Canadians through acts of violence.

Terrorism is not simply a crime. It is also an existential threat to our society, and Government has a legitimate interest in preventing terrorism, above and beyond that of punishing terrorists as criminals (see: Security, Freedom and the Complex Terrorism Threat: Positive Steps Ahead, Special Senate Committee on Anti-Terrorism, 2010).

Preventing terrorist financing prevents terrorists from committing terrorist acts. It’s that simple.

Canada’s New Anti-Terrorism Act, 2015 – Bill C51

By Christine Duhaime | February 1st, 2015

1. New Anti-Terrorism Act, 2015

The Government of Canada introduced its anticipated anti-terrorism legislation in Parliament. Bill C-51, entitled “An Act to Enact the Security of Canada Information Sharing Act and the Secure Air Travel Act” (the “Anti-Terrorism Act, 2015“) which is intended to arm the government with broader powers to address the increasing threat of terrorism in this country from homegrown terrorists and abroad, mainly as a result of the rise of the Islamic State (“ISIS“) and recent resurgence of al Qaeda. The purpose of the Anti-Terrorism Act, 2015, is to ensure Canada is not used as a conduit for international terrorism.

In a nutshell, it:

  • Authorizes CSIS to stop threats to Canada in foreign countries;
  • Permits the judicial management of a person suspected of being a terrorist including geographic restrictions on their movements;
  • Requires that persons and entities that have electronic custody of terrorist propaganda published online disclose the identity and location of persons who posted the propaganda;
  • Makes it a criminal offence to publish terrorist propaganda;
  • Requires that the private sector (air carriers) deny air passage to suspected Canadian terrorists at the direction of the government;
  • Requires the creation of a secret list of suspected terrorists for the purposes of the no-fly list that the private sector will enforce; and
  • Permits the sharing of information among federal agencies to detect activities that undermine the safety of Canada.

2. Information Sharing Act

The Anti-Terrorism Act, 2015, enacts a new law to authorize and facilitate the sharing of information among government agencies in situations where there is “activity that undermines the security” of Canada or the lives or security of Canadians.

“Activities that Undermine Security”

The definition of activities that undermine the security of Canada is important because everything in relation to information-sharing for counter-terrorism efforts is pinned to it.

Activity that undermines Canada, and ergo, authorizes the sharing of information, arises in the following situations:

  • Interfering with the capability of Canada to undertake intelligence-gathering, defence, justice administration, economic stability or financial stability. This could apply to any terrorism activity or cyber-hacking activities that involve the foregoing. If you hack a major bank, or a Court or Court records, that may interfere with financial stability or the administration of justice.
  • Unduly influencing a government agency in Canada by force or unlawfully.
  • Covert foreign-influenced activities.
  • Terrorism.
  • Proliferating WMD.
  • Critical infrastructure interference. This is a key one that is important given that terrorists specifically target critical infrastructure such as energy, electricity, Internet, water supply, government buildings.
  • Global infrastructure interference. This means basically our electronic communications (emails, texts, telephone calls or social media communications) carried on through networks that extend beyond Canada.
  • Activities in Canada that undermine the security of another state. This applies to all the homegrown terrorists in Canada that work for, support or propagandize for organizations like ISIS or al Qaeda, including sending funds or material support to terrorist organizations. It also applies to social media publications in support of terrorist organizations, or that are terrorist propaganda. See the new terrorist propaganda offence, below, and note that there is a tie in with that new offence and the sharing of information.

Information Sharing

Certain federal government agencies are allowed to share information in respect of any person or entity to other federal agencies when there are “activities that undermine the security of Canada.”

The broadness of the circumstances permitting disclosure, above, should not be discounted. Moreover, disclosure of such information is authorized to “detect” activities that undermine the security of Canada, and to prevent, investigate or disrupt such potential threatening activities.

The authorization of disclosure for detection purposes is important because the impugned conduct has not yet occurred. In other words, no terrorist conduct must necessarily have occurred that undermines the security of Canada since disclosure is permitted to detect it.

The agencies that may share information include but are not limited to the CBSA, RCMP, FINTRAC, National Defence, Health Canada, Department of Finance, CIC, CSIS, CRA and Canadian Armed Forces.

3. Secure Air Travel Act

Secret List of Potential Terrorists For Airlines

The Anti-Terrorism Act, 2015 enacts another new law that allows the government to create a secret list of persons that it believes may, inter alia: engage in an act that threatens transportation security; participate in the activities of a terrorist group; fund a terrorist group or a terrorist; or provide material support or property to such a person or group.

No Re-Entry to Canada

The purpose of the list is to identify persons in Canada (or outside of it) that are a threat to national security and to require that air carriers prevent such a person from boarding an aircraft, or require that they be screened before entering an air carrier or an airport. The blocking of a person applies in and outside of Canada.

A person denied entry to fly out of or into Canada may apply for removal from the list within 60 days and they can appeal an unfavorable result.

4. Criminal Code

Terrorist Propaganda

The Anti-Terrorism Act, 2015, also amends the terrorist provisions in the Criminal Code of Canada, R.S.C., 1985, c. C-46 (the “Criminal Code“), by making it an offence to make statements, or communicate statements that advocate or promote, inter alia, terrorist acts, terrorist financing, or providing material support or property to a terrorist or terrorist group knowing that a terrorist offence will result or being reckless as to whether it results.

The amendments also authorize the seizure of terrorist propaganda in hard copies. If there is terrorist propaganda published online, a court may require that an electronic copy of the material be provided to the court, order its removal from the Internet and order that the custodian of the propaganda disclose the identity and location of the person who posted the propaganda. This would apply not just to ISPs but anyone who is publishing terrorist propaganda.

Monitoring & House Arrest of Suspected Terrorists

The Criminal Code will also be amended to permit special procedures for persons who are likely to commit a terrorist offence, including terrorist financing. Such a person may be ordered to enter into a recognizance to keep the peace for up to 12 months. They may also be ordered to participate in a counter-terrorism program, wear an electronic monitoring bracelet, be under house-arrest for certain hours each day, surrender his or her passport, and be geographically restricted.

5.  CSIS Act

The Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act, R.S.C., 1985, c. C-23 (“CSIS Act“) will also be amended to authorize CSIS to reduce threats inside or outside of Canada if it has reasonable grounds to believe an activity threatens the security of Canada.

Determining the gravity of the threat to national security posed by a defector attempting to return to Canada is an example where it requires that CSIS be in terrorist hot spots. Such investigations, to be effective, require that CSIS be overseas.

Arrest of the Queen of ISIS sheds light on terrorist financing through Lebanese charities for refugees

By Christine Duhaime | January 30th, 2015

According to an article in the Washington Post, the arrest of Saja Hamid al Dulaimi, the ex-wife of the leader of the Islamic State, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, has shed light on terrorist financing methods used by ISIS in Lebanon.

The Queen of ISIS was arrested in November 2014, attempting to enter Lebanon with her daughter, who is also the daughter of al-Baghdadi, using fake government identity issued in Syria by ISIS. Dulaimi is Iraqi.

According to the investigation of Dulaimi after she was arrested, it appears that she acted as a money mule for ISIS, transporting money from Lebanon to ISIS in Syria that had been sent to Lebanon by wealthy persons in the Persian Gulf, ostensibly for the aid of Syrian refugees. The funds were sent via wire transfers to charities in Lebanon and handed to Dulaimi, who made the physical transfers of cash to ISIS.

Dulaimi was living in a refugee camp on the Syrian border under fake ID and pretended to be a victim of terrorism. The camp, according to the article, is home to many other ISIS family members. Members of the Kurdish community have similarly said that former members of ISIS and their families are living in refugee camps under fake IDs so that they cannot be detected.