In October 2020, ABA ROLI initiated a cross-regional program between two of its regions, the Middle East and North Africa division and the Asia and Pacific division, to build the capacity of Financial Intelligence Units (FIUs), regulators, investigators, and law enforcement agents to apply analytical frameworks, strategies, and skills for the utilization of open-source intelligence (OSINT) in integrated anti-money laundering investigations. The Transnational Anti-Money Laundering Assistance—Training to Leverage Big Data Analytics to Identify Money Laundering and Sanctions Evasion program (TAMLA program) is funded by the U.S. Department of State Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL).
In the Middle East and North Africa division, the program is focused on Tunisia, where ABA ROLI has partnered with the Tunisian FIU and the Tunisian Financial Analysis Committee (CTAF), on a series of training sessions and the deployment of an e-learning module on OSINT, Big Data, and anti-money laundering (AML) investigation techniques. To date more than 80 participants have been trained on topics ranging from the collection and management of OSINT, utilizing OSINT in AML investigations, to the development of case files using OSINT.