International Serious and Organised Crime Conference 2013
 

Concurrent session 1a—Intelligence: Fusion—What is it and how is it being used to address serious organised crime?

Dr Katie Willis, Manager, Fusion Monitoring, Australian Crime Commission

In 2010, the Commonwealth Attorney-General and Minister for Home Affairs officially launched the Criminal Intelligence Fusion Centre, a national hub for the National Criminal Intelligence Fusion Capability (Fusion) that is based at the Australian Crime Commission. Twenty government bodies, including all State/Territory police agencies as well as a range of national-level agencies, are active partners in Fusion. Fusion is about integrating, or ‘fusing’, the national criminal intelligence picture. Fusion is about data, people and tools. As such, it is as much about collection and integration with traditional law enforcement capabilities as it is about advanced analytics and sophisticated analysis tools. Fusion represents a significant step towards delivery of an evidence-based, real-time national picture of the risk posed to Australia by serious organised crime. Through the integration of an expanding set of public and private sector information holdings with the ACC’s criminal intelligence, Fusion is able to identify patterns of serious organised crime and the flows of money associated with this crime. From this information, Fusion is then able to identify the individuals, businesses and corporate structures involved in organised criminal enterprises. A broad range of criminal activities and criminal groups are targeted through the results of Fusion activity, including (for example) those involved in cybercrime, illicit firearms, people smuggling, money laundering and narcotics importation. Now in its third year of operation, Fusion continues to evolve. This presentation will provide an overview of Fusion, its implementation to date and some of the future opportunities it may provide law enforcement, regulatory agencies and others concerned with addressing serious organised criminal activity.