Advances in data science, such as data mining, data visualization, and artificial intelligence (machine and deep learning), are extremely well-suited to address numerous questions in financial and criminal intelligence given the explosion of available data.

 Despite these opportunities, few scholars and practitioners in our field of financial and criminal intelligence have discussed the specific impacts of big data on a) the analysis and generation of actionable intelligence, and b) the exploration and elaboration of unforeseen typologies from multiple data sets available in financial intelligence units (FIUs) and law enforcement agencies (LEAs). The purpose of this book is to provide an overview of the big data phenomenon and its potential for impacting financial and criminal intelligence in positive ways. We identify the biggest opportunities afforded by big data along with the biggest obstacles, and we discuss specifically the need of a paradigm shift on financial analysis. We also provide a list of resources to help interested readers incorporate big data methods into their existing works. Our hope is that we stimulate interest in big data, motivate future research using big data sources, and encourage the application of associated data science techniques more broadly in financial and criminal intelligence.

Computer scientists, information and communication specialists, mathematicians, statisticians, programmers, qualitatively and quantitatively minded scientist-practitioners; and experts in AML/CFT, we are ideally situated to help drive the questions and analytics behind the big data phenomenon in financial and criminal intelligence.