Directory

Nikos Passas | Northeastern University - Academia.edu

Skip to main content

Nikos Passas

Northeastern University, College Of Criminal Justice, Faculty Member

Followers

71,360

Following

58

Co-authors

6

Public Views

Johannes Zachhuber

University of Oxford

University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP)

University of Oxford

National University of "Kyiv-Mohyla Academy"

The University of Sheffield

Kansas State University

University of Cologne

Armando Marques-Guedes

UNL - New University of Lisbon

francesco clementi

Università degli Studi "La Sapienza" di Roma

Giacomo Delledonne

Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna

InterestsView All (24)

Uploads

Papers by Nikos Passas

AI-SNIPS: A Platform for Network Intelligence-Based Pharmaceutical Security

Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence

This paper presents AI-SNIPS (AI Support for Network Intelligence-based Pharmaceutical Security),... more This paper presents AI-SNIPS (AI Support for Network Intelligence-based Pharmaceutical Security), a production-ready platform that enables stakeholder decision-making, secure data sharing, and interdisciplinary research in the fight against Illicit, Substandard, and Falsified Medical Products (ISFMP). AI-SNIPS takes as input cases: a case consists of one or more URLs suspected of ISFMP activity. Cases can be supplemented with ground-truth structured data (labeled keywords) such as seller PII or case notes. First, AI-SNIPS scrapes and stores relevant images and text from the provided URLs without any user intervention. Salient features for predicting case similarity are extracted from the aggregated data using a combination of rule-based and machine-learning techniques and used to construct a seller network, with the nodes representing cases (sellers) and the edges representing the similarity between two sellers. Network analysis and community detection techniques are applied to extr...

The Future of Anomie Theory

Social Forces, Sep 1, 1999

Controlling cross border undercover operations

Invading the Private, 2019

Sports Corruption: Justice and Accountability through the Use of the UNCAC and the UNTOC

Implementation of anti-corruption strategy of the Republic of Kazakhstan for 2025 provisions as t... more

Merton's theory of anomie and deviance : An elaboration

The thesis is an attempt to elaborate and develop Merton's theory of anamie and deviance. The pur... more

Transnational crime & the interface between legal and illegal actors

Informal Value Transfer Systems and Criminal Activities

Having offered a more precise definition of the practices and issues involved in what is indiscri... more Having offered a more precise definition of the practices and issues involved in what is indiscriminately called underground banking, as well as a brief look at the origin of the practices in question, this report outlines the findings of a parallel study, discusses the prevalent modus operandi, incorporates the findings of a wider IVTS research, examines the factors contributing to IVTS continued popularity and concludes with a summary of the findings and policy implications.

International Crimes

International Crimes, 2017

Chapters in SUERF Studies, 2016

Over millennia, mankind has used hard cash in various forms ranging from shells to gold coins and... more Over millennia, mankind has used hard cash in various forms ranging from shells to gold coins and paper. More recently, cash has become unpopular in political circles, as it effectively restricts states’ power to tax (explicitly or via negative interest rates) or to survey and potentially control their citizens. Several states have enacted restrictions to the use of hard cash. Above all, a strong new competitor to cash has arisen in the form of various electronic means of payment. Are we heading towards a society in which ‘coined freedom’ (Dostojewski) will cease to exist? Under this provocative ‘motto’ SUERF organised a combined evening event (in German at the University of Zurich) and one-day conference (in English at the theatre ‘Millers’ in Zurich) to take stock of the arguments brought forward in the current debate on the pros and cons and, more generally, the future of cash.

Understanding Contemporary Maritime Piracy – A Case Study of Somalia

Controlling piracy in Southeast Asia – thinking outside the box

Edward Elgar Publishing eBooks, Oct 31, 2012

State and corporate drivers of global dysnomie: horrendous crimes and the law

Hidden agendas, social norms and why we need to re-think anti-corruption

Working Paper 22: Hidden agendas, social norms and why we need to re-think anti-corruption

Working paper series, Jun 1, 2017

Terrorist Finance, Informal Markets, Trade and Regulation: Challenges of Evidence Regarding International Efforts

Springer eBooks, Aug 19, 2011

ABSTRACT Terrorism is not a new problem, and politically motivated offending has been handled in... more ABSTRACT Terrorism is not a new problem, and politically motivated offending has been handled in a variety of ways from ancient Greece to modern times (Passas, 1986). The process of globalization and the cross-border movement of ideas, information, people, goods, and capital, have brought terrorism to the fore of public, media, and government attention. Policymakers, scholars, and others have increased their efforts to understand, detect, and prevent this phenomenon, which defies scientific and universal definition (National Research Council, 2002). A necessary and important piece of this puzzle involves the financing of terrorist activities. In the aftermath of the 11 September 2001 attacks in New York and Washington, DC (hereafter “9/11”), countering of terrorist funding took center stage as a focus of global law enforcement and policy (Giraldo &amp; Trinkunas, 2007; Naylor, 2006; Passas, 2008; Pieth, Thelesklaf, &amp; Ivory, 2009; Warde, 2007).

Anomie and White-Collar Crime

Encyclopedia of Criminological Theory, Oct 5, 2012

Overseeing and overlooking: The US federal authorities’ response to money laundering and other misconduct at BCCI

Springer eBooks, 2001

This article examines evidence from the case of the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BC... more This article examines evidence from the case of the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) affair, one of the largest international financial frauds in history, to illustrate the effects of a crime-facilitative environment in the international banking community. We argue that the official response to BCCI-related law violations was hampered by (1) A fragmented and compartmentalized approach to regulation and law enforcement; (2) conflicting political and policy objectives among different government agencies; (3) the ability of corporations to buy influence and affect official controls; (4) legal restraints undermining the ability to control transnational offenders. None of these problems has been effectively addressed in the aftermath of the scandal. The chances that such affairs will happen again are therefore quite high.

2. Terrorism Financing Mechanisms and Policy Dilemmas

Stanford University Press eBooks, Mar 19, 2007

The regulation and supervision of informal remittance systems

Small Enterprise Development, Mar 10, 2004

is a financial sector specialist in the South Asia Region of the World Bank. Since March 2002, he... more is a financial sector specialist in the South Asia Region of the World Bank. Since March 2002, he has led the Bank's work on informal remittance systems. His publications on the subject include a joint IMF-World Bank Occasional paper entitled Informal Funds Transfer Systems: An Analysis of the Informal Hawala System, and a World Bank Working Paper entitled: The Hawaladars of Kabul: A Study of the Hawala System in Afghanistan. Both were published in August 2003. Before joining the World Bank, Maimbo was a senior bank inspector with the Bank of Zambia (1995-97), and briefly an auditor with PriceWaterhouse. A Rhodes Scholar, he obtained a PhD in Public Administration (2001) and an MBA (Finance) Degree (1998) from the University of Manchester and the University of Nottingham, respectively. He is a fellow of the U.K. Association of Certified Chartered Accountants (ACCA) and of the Zambia Institute of Certified Accountants (ZICA).

The Future of Anomie Theory

Contemporary Sociology, 2000

AI-SNIPS: A Platform for Network Intelligence-Based Pharmaceutical Security

Proceedings of the AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence

This paper presents AI-SNIPS (AI Support for Network Intelligence-based Pharmaceutical Security),... more This paper presents AI-SNIPS (AI Support for Network Intelligence-based Pharmaceutical Security), a production-ready platform that enables stakeholder decision-making, secure data sharing, and interdisciplinary research in the fight against Illicit, Substandard, and Falsified Medical Products (ISFMP). AI-SNIPS takes as input cases: a case consists of one or more URLs suspected of ISFMP activity. Cases can be supplemented with ground-truth structured data (labeled keywords) such as seller PII or case notes. First, AI-SNIPS scrapes and stores relevant images and text from the provided URLs without any user intervention. Salient features for predicting case similarity are extracted from the aggregated data using a combination of rule-based and machine-learning techniques and used to construct a seller network, with the nodes representing cases (sellers) and the edges representing the similarity between two sellers. Network analysis and community detection techniques are applied to extr...

The Future of Anomie Theory

Social Forces, Sep 1, 1999

Controlling cross border undercover operations

Invading the Private, 2019

Sports Corruption: Justice and Accountability through the Use of the UNCAC and the UNTOC

Implementation of anti-corruption strategy of the Republic of Kazakhstan for 2025 provisions as t... more

Merton's theory of anomie and deviance : An elaboration

The thesis is an attempt to elaborate and develop Merton's theory of anamie and deviance. The pur... more

Transnational crime & the interface between legal and illegal actors

Informal Value Transfer Systems and Criminal Activities

Having offered a more precise definition of the practices and issues involved in what is indiscri... more Having offered a more precise definition of the practices and issues involved in what is indiscriminately called underground banking, as well as a brief look at the origin of the practices in question, this report outlines the findings of a parallel study, discusses the prevalent modus operandi, incorporates the findings of a wider IVTS research, examines the factors contributing to IVTS continued popularity and concludes with a summary of the findings and policy implications.

International Crimes

International Crimes, 2017

Chapters in SUERF Studies, 2016

Over millennia, mankind has used hard cash in various forms ranging from shells to gold coins and... more Over millennia, mankind has used hard cash in various forms ranging from shells to gold coins and paper. More recently, cash has become unpopular in political circles, as it effectively restricts states’ power to tax (explicitly or via negative interest rates) or to survey and potentially control their citizens. Several states have enacted restrictions to the use of hard cash. Above all, a strong new competitor to cash has arisen in the form of various electronic means of payment. Are we heading towards a society in which ‘coined freedom’ (Dostojewski) will cease to exist? Under this provocative ‘motto’ SUERF organised a combined evening event (in German at the University of Zurich) and one-day conference (in English at the theatre ‘Millers’ in Zurich) to take stock of the arguments brought forward in the current debate on the pros and cons and, more generally, the future of cash.

Understanding Contemporary Maritime Piracy – A Case Study of Somalia

Controlling piracy in Southeast Asia – thinking outside the box

Edward Elgar Publishing eBooks, Oct 31, 2012

State and corporate drivers of global dysnomie: horrendous crimes and the law

Hidden agendas, social norms and why we need to re-think anti-corruption

Working Paper 22: Hidden agendas, social norms and why we need to re-think anti-corruption

Working paper series, Jun 1, 2017

Terrorist Finance, Informal Markets, Trade and Regulation: Challenges of Evidence Regarding International Efforts

Springer eBooks, Aug 19, 2011

ABSTRACT Terrorism is not a new problem, and politically motivated offending has been handled in... more ABSTRACT Terrorism is not a new problem, and politically motivated offending has been handled in a variety of ways from ancient Greece to modern times (Passas, 1986). The process of globalization and the cross-border movement of ideas, information, people, goods, and capital, have brought terrorism to the fore of public, media, and government attention. Policymakers, scholars, and others have increased their efforts to understand, detect, and prevent this phenomenon, which defies scientific and universal definition (National Research Council, 2002). A necessary and important piece of this puzzle involves the financing of terrorist activities. In the aftermath of the 11 September 2001 attacks in New York and Washington, DC (hereafter “9/11”), countering of terrorist funding took center stage as a focus of global law enforcement and policy (Giraldo &amp; Trinkunas, 2007; Naylor, 2006; Passas, 2008; Pieth, Thelesklaf, &amp; Ivory, 2009; Warde, 2007).

Anomie and White-Collar Crime

Encyclopedia of Criminological Theory, Oct 5, 2012

Overseeing and overlooking: The US federal authorities’ response to money laundering and other misconduct at BCCI

Springer eBooks, 2001

This article examines evidence from the case of the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BC... more This article examines evidence from the case of the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) affair, one of the largest international financial frauds in history, to illustrate the effects of a crime-facilitative environment in the international banking community. We argue that the official response to BCCI-related law violations was hampered by (1) A fragmented and compartmentalized approach to regulation and law enforcement; (2) conflicting political and policy objectives among different government agencies; (3) the ability of corporations to buy influence and affect official controls; (4) legal restraints undermining the ability to control transnational offenders. None of these problems has been effectively addressed in the aftermath of the scandal. The chances that such affairs will happen again are therefore quite high.

2. Terrorism Financing Mechanisms and Policy Dilemmas

Stanford University Press eBooks, Mar 19, 2007

The regulation and supervision of informal remittance systems

Small Enterprise Development, Mar 10, 2004

is a financial sector specialist in the South Asia Region of the World Bank. Since March 2002, he... more is a financial sector specialist in the South Asia Region of the World Bank. Since March 2002, he has led the Bank's work on informal remittance systems. His publications on the subject include a joint IMF-World Bank Occasional paper entitled Informal Funds Transfer Systems: An Analysis of the Informal Hawala System, and a World Bank Working Paper entitled: The Hawaladars of Kabul: A Study of the Hawala System in Afghanistan. Both were published in August 2003. Before joining the World Bank, Maimbo was a senior bank inspector with the Bank of Zambia (1995-97), and briefly an auditor with PriceWaterhouse. A Rhodes Scholar, he obtained a PhD in Public Administration (2001) and an MBA (Finance) Degree (1998) from the University of Manchester and the University of Nottingham, respectively. He is a fellow of the U.K. Association of Certified Chartered Accountants (ACCA) and of the Zambia Institute of Certified Accountants (ZICA).

The Future of Anomie Theory

Contemporary Sociology, 2000

Passas testimony in Congress on international trade, money laundering and terrorism finance

Afghanistan Study.docx

by Nikos Passas and Nicolas Giannakopoulos

“Drug-related financial flows bear serious consequences for Afghanistan, which include funding te... more “Drug-related financial flows bear serious consequences for Afghanistan, which include funding terrorism, nurturing corruption, undermining the rule of law and depriving the state of desperately needed revenue and resources,” according to Dr. Nikos Passas, co-director of the Institute for Security and Public Policy at Northeastern University’s School of Criminology and Criminal Justice, and co-author of the report. “Unfortunately, detailed information on the narcotics financing is scarce, and research rarely addresses the banking/finance-specific aspects of the narcotics trade. This report fills that gap by highlighting the missing information about drug-related financial flows and how it may be obtained or generated in order to inform future policy.”