Online organized crime investigations: how merchants can work with federal agencies
Guest: Dave Smith & Raul Aguilar
Today I am talking about online organized crime investigations, and honestly, this is one of those conversations I was especially glad to have because it answers questions I hear all the time from fraud teams. Who do we contact. Will anyone actually follow up. What kinds of cases matter most. And how do we work with law enforcement without wasting time or sending intelligence into a black hole.
Those are fair questions.
Because a lot of ecommerce fraud investigations stay internal for a reason. Teams are busy. Losses are piling up. And many have had past experiences that made law enforcement fraud collaboration feel confusing, inconsistent, or just not worth the effort. Meanwhile, the fraud itself keeps getting more organized, more international, and more expensive.
In this episode, I sat down with Dave Smith of the US Secret Service and Raul Aguilar of Homeland Security Investigations to talk about transnational organized crime, online financial crime, and how their agencies are thinking about fraud investigations right now. What stood out to me is that both of them were very direct about the reality. These agencies are trying to re-engage. They want stronger fraud law enforcement partnerships. And they know trust has to be rebuilt.
That matters.
Because when fraud teams are dealing with organized retail crime, cross-border abuse, or larger patterns of cyber-enabled financial crime, there is only so much any company can do on its own. At some point, if the goal is disruption, prosecution, or broader intelligence sharing, law enforcement has to be part of the picture.
This conversation is really about making that picture clearer. Not pretending the system is perfect. Not pretending every case will get immediate action. But getting more practical about how merchant fraud investigations can connect with federal fraud investigations, what fraud case referrals should look like, and how cross-agency fraud collaboration can improve outcomes over time.
Here is what that online organized crime investigations mindset means in practice:
- I need to understand which agencies may be relevant to different fraud patterns and case types
- I need fraud case referrals that are organized, useful, and tied to broader criminal patterns when possible
- I need fraud intelligence sharing that supports action, not just documentation
- I need stronger fraud law enforcement partnerships when internal investigations point to organized activity
What you’ll hear in this episode:
- Why online organized crime investigations often involve transnational organized crime and multiple agencies
- How law enforcement fraud collaboration is changing inside the US Secret Service and Homeland Security Investigations
- What merchants should know about fraud case referrals and ecommerce fraud investigations
- Why cross-agency fraud collaboration matters in organized retail crime and online financial crime cases
- How fraud prosecution support and intelligence sharing can improve when companies know where to go
You should listen to this episode if you:
- Work in fraud, trust and safety, ecommerce risk, investigations, or payments and need clearer law enforcement guidance
- Handle merchant fraud investigations and want a better understanding of federal fraud investigations
- Need to know when to escalate online financial crime or transnational organized crime patterns
- Want stronger fraud intelligence sharing and fraud law enforcement partnerships
- Care about cybercrime law enforcement, organized retail crime, and practical case escalation
If you liked this episode, be sure to subscribe and review the podcast on iTunes, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you listen to podcasts. It really helps with getting the word out.
Episode notes & key takeaways
This episode gets into a part of fraud work that a lot of teams struggle with for very understandable reasons. Law enforcement can feel difficult to navigate, especially when companies are already overwhelmed and trying to manage losses in real time. But if fraud is increasingly tied to organized groups, cross-border networks, and repeat criminal infrastructure, then online organized crime investigations cannot stay someone else’s problem forever.
Why online organized crime investigations require a bigger view
Let’s break this down.
One of the clearest themes in this conversation is that a lot of fraud companies experience every day is not random, isolated, or purely opportunistic. It is often connected to transnational organized crime, coordinated networks, and actors operating across platforms, regions, and jurisdictions. That changes how I need to think about the problem.
Because once fraud is organized, the response has to be more organized too.
A merchant may only see a slice of the scheme. Another company sees a different slice. A payment provider sees something else. A marketplace sees another piece. Law enforcement, ideally, is one of the few groups in a position to connect those pieces across cases and across companies. That is what makes online organized crime investigations so important, even when the individual fraud event first shows up as a routine internal case.
This is exactly why teams need to step back and ask whether the activity they are seeing points to a larger pattern. If it does, the case may have more value as part of a broader law enforcement fraud collaboration effort than as a standalone internal incident.
- Online organized crime investigations often depend on seeing the full criminal pattern, not just one loss event
- Transnational organized crime can touch multiple merchants, platforms, and payment systems at once
- Ecommerce fraud investigations become more useful when teams identify links across cases
- Fraud intelligence sharing can help connect what one company cannot see on its own
Why fraud teams have hesitated to work with law enforcement
Here’s what’s actually happening.
A lot of fraud professionals have been reluctant to engage law enforcement, and honestly, that did not come out of nowhere. Many teams have felt like reporting a case led nowhere, took too much time, or never produced meaningful follow-up. So they adapted. They built stronger internal investigations. They focused on prevention, containment, and loss management. And in many situations, that made sense.
But it also created distance.
Dave and Raul acknowledge that reality in this conversation, which I appreciated. They are not pretending the history has been frictionless. They are very clear that their agencies are trying to re-engage in fraud investigations, rebuild credibility, and help companies understand where and how cases can fit into the federal system.
That is the part fraud teams should pay attention to.
Because when agency leaders are openly talking about under-resourcing, prioritization, and the need for collaboration, that gives companies a more realistic foundation to work from. Not false promises. Real constraints. And frankly, that is more useful.
- Law enforcement fraud collaboration has often felt difficult because companies did not see clear results
- Cybercrime law enforcement agencies are trying to re-engage with fraud teams in more practical ways
- Fraud law enforcement partnerships work better when expectations are realistic from the start
- Federal fraud investigations are shaped by priorities, resources, and broader criminal patterns
What better fraud case referrals actually look like
This is where things get especially practical.
A lot of teams ask whether they should report a case, but the better question is often how they should report it. Because fraud case referrals are much more useful when they are organized around patterns, evidence, and impact instead of just frustration. And yes, frustration is understandable. It just is not especially actionable on its own.
The key thing to understand is that context matters.
If a company can show links across accounts, repeated infrastructure, common shipping or mule patterns, connected identities, geographic overlap, payment behavior, or ties to organized retail crime or broader online financial crime, that is a much stronger starting point than a single unsupported complaint. The same is true for intelligence that helps show scale, victim impact, or how the fraud operation is actually functioning.
This is why merchant fraud investigations need to think beyond “we have losses” and move toward “here is the structure, pattern, and criminal behavior we are seeing.” That kind of fraud prosecution support is more likely to travel.
- Fraud case referrals are stronger when they include patterns, infrastructure, and connected evidence
- Merchant fraud investigations should highlight scale, linkage, and criminal organization where possible
- Fraud prosecution support improves when companies package intelligence clearly
- Federal fraud investigations benefit from case referrals that show more than one isolated event
Why USSS and HSI alignment matters for merchants
One thing I thought was especially important in this episode is that Dave Smith and Raul Aguilar chose to have this conversation together. That was not accidental. It was meant to show commitment to cross-agency fraud collaboration, and honestly, that matters more than people might think.
Because from the merchant side, agency lines can be confusing.
If I am dealing with online financial crime, cyber-enabled fraud, organized retail crime, or broader transnational organized crime, I may not know whether the US Secret Service fraud cases route makes more sense, whether Homeland Security Investigations fraud teams are the better fit, or whether both may have a role depending on the pattern. Hearing leaders from both agencies talk together helps make the point that collaboration is possible and that companies do not always have to solve the routing question alone before raising their hand.
Right.
That does not mean every case will become a joint priority. But it does suggest a more coordinated approach than many fraud teams may have assumed based on older experiences.
- Cross-agency fraud collaboration can make referrals more effective for complex criminal patterns
- US Secret Service fraud cases and Homeland Security Investigations fraud cases may overlap in important ways
- Fraud law enforcement partnerships improve when agencies demonstrate shared commitment
- Merchants benefit when law enforcement coordination reduces confusion about where cases belong
How fraud teams should think about escalation and intelligence sharing
This might not seem like a big deal. But in fraud prevention, it absolutely is.
Not every case belongs with federal law enforcement. That is just reality. But some absolutely do. And fraud teams need a better framework for spotting the difference. If the activity looks coordinated, cross-border, repeatable, infrastructure-driven, or linked to broader criminal networks, that is usually a sign the case may have value beyond internal containment.
That is where fraud intelligence sharing becomes more than a reporting exercise.
The goal is not simply to hand over a pile of evidence and hope for the best. The goal is to support a broader disruption effort. That means thinking about what law enforcement can do that a merchant cannot. Seize infrastructure. Connect cases across industries. Pursue criminal networks. Build toward arrests and prosecution. Those are very different capabilities than an internal fraud team has.
And that matters. Because once fraud leaders understand what makes a case more useful externally, they can build better escalation habits internally.
- Fraud intelligence sharing is most useful when the case has broader disruption value
- Online financial crime linked to organized networks may deserve federal escalation
- Ecommerce fraud investigations should include escalation criteria, not just internal resolution paths
- Fraud law enforcement partnerships get stronger when companies know what kinds of cases travel best
The big takeaway from this episode is pretty straightforward. Online organized crime investigations are becoming more relevant for more fraud teams because the fraud itself is increasingly organized, distributed, and transnational. Dave Smith and Raul Aguilar do a good job of being candid about the challenges while also making it clear that their agencies want stronger collaboration with the private sector. And honestly, that is the part I think matters most. If companies want better outcomes from law enforcement, they need clearer referrals, stronger intelligence packaging, and a more realistic view of how federal fraud investigations actually work. That does not solve everything. But it is a much better place to start than silence.
