Product fraud and product counterfeiting as a source of terrorist financing

Abstract

This short contribution is a complementary addition that addresses unexplored aspects of our recent Security Journal article When Crime Events Defy Classification: The Case of Product Counterfeiting as White-Collar Crime. One of those unexplored aspects is regarding the proceeds of product fraud or counterfeiting as important to the conceptual studies on combating terrorism – this is currently a focus in Food Fraud regulations and laws. The current research is often based on the assumption of pure terrorists who are pure product counterfeiters. The important theoretical dimension of criminology is that product counterfeiting is one of the many sources of the funding of terrorism and the choice is based on the opportunity. There is evidence that if the opportunity related to product counterfeiting does not exist – or is reduced – the terrorist will select a different method to fund their operations. For example, product counterfeiting of CDs and DVDs was only one of many sources of funding of the 1993 World Trade Center attack. This article builds upon our previous work and reviews several key and influential reports for their assessment on the research question.