Ilze Znotiņa: We will maintain our intolerance of abusive treatment of the financial system of Latvia

Ilze Znotiņa, the Head of the FIU Latvia: “Reasons why people get involved in risky deals are various. This could be an intentional action to gain fast profit, or an unintentional action rooted in unawareness of laws. We organise this campaign to teach the business people and society to recognise “red flags” and avoid involvement in organised crime due to their unawareness. We wish to increase the public understanding that tolerance towards crimes cannot be permitted, as this attitude steals from ourselves and our closest people. The digital game and other activities are our first steps by the Financial Intelligence Unit to increase understanding and promote intolerance of those who abuse the financial system of Latvia”.

The educational campaign “Know the laws of money!” is supported also by business representatives – Latvian Employers Confederation (LDDK) and Business Union of Latvia highlighting the necessity to inform and educate businesses about risks of economic crimes that their enterprises can face.

LDDK financial and tax expert Jānis Hermanis stresses, “LDDK unites socially responsible employers whose priorities include a safe, predictable and organised environment to develop business. It is important that the responsible institutions explain and advise to improve communication and facilitate understanding about financial risk management in business. Reputation of especially the financial sector is a principal condition for competitiveness both at the national and international level, as well as for successful attraction of investments.”

“Financial crimes are possible if the society in general has a low level of financial and digital skills because there will always be shearers for sheep. Most often, it is a structured and technologically developed business that we can prevent if we are well informed and organised – representatives from responsible institutions, financial, information technology companies and educational sector, and, of course, the industry,” comments the council chairperson and business person Elīna Egle from the Business Union of Latvia during the opening of the campaign.

While discussing and searching for answers to the question “Why do people get involved in financial crimes?”, LU professor in social psychology Ivars Austers indicated that involvement in financial crimes is sometimes a result of absolutely trivial chain of events, for example, helping a friend or colleague, and we would not qualify this as a violation, it is simply a friendly gesture. Likewise, he stressed significance of education, “When educating the society and building an idealised world, the bad cases need to be disclosed as they can keep representatives of the public away from unlawful activities. By improving the general level of public morals, we will also improve the situation in the sector of financial crimes.”

In turn, social anthropologist Andris Saulītis stressed the significance of proportionality of the penalty – it should not be too low thus facilitating the desire to violate the law, nor too high when the wrongdoer wants to recover the money paid as fine, again probably by illegal means. In his opinion, efficiency of state institutions plays an important role: where services are easily available, the attitude is friendly, then the desire to use illegal means will significantly decrease.

To close the discussion, the Head of the FIU Latvia Ilze Znotiņa indicated that companies that manage large flows of money, handle exports and imports, should pay much attention to the internal security control or hygiene. Unfortunately, carelessness, greed, stinginess or simply ignorance can lead to very undesirable consequences to companies.

The digital game is available here. The game is only in Latvian.

The campaign is organised also in social media - FIU of Latvia Twitter and Facebook accounts.

Regarding campaign “Know the laws of money!”

Campaign “Know the laws of money!” – educational campaign for entrepreneurs and the public to increase understanding of economic and financial crimes. The digital educational game of the campaign invites everyone to test their knowledge about the risks of economic and financial crimes and actions to be taken in these situations.
The campaign is organised by the Financial Intelligence Unit, supported by the Latvian Employers Confederation and Business Union of Latvia.

Follow the campaign:
Web: https://www.fid.gov.lv/naudas-likumi
Twitter: @naudas_likumi
Facebook: Naudas likumi