The Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU) has uncovered new methods allegedly being used by terrorist financiers to conceal the identities of those controlling illicit funds, including the use of women’s bank accounts, pre-registered SIM cards and phone numbers linked to deceased persons.
The disclosure was contained in the NFIU’s 2025 Annual Report, which identified weak customer identification controls and disconnected links between SIM cards and Bank Verification Numbers (BVNs) as emerging enablers of terrorist financing and other financial crimes.
According to the report, some terrorist facilitators use SIM cards that are not registered to the actual users of bank accounts.
Others reportedly rely on pre-registered SIMs and numbers linked to deceased persons to avoid detection.
The NFIU said the practice makes it difficult for investigators to establish the real identity of individuals behind suspicious transactions because the phone numbers connected to financial activities may belong to unrelated or deceased persons.
The agency also identified the use of women as financial proxies as another emerging tactic.
It said bank accounts are sometimes opened in the names of wives, sisters or female associates, while male commanders, logistics managers or other operatives secretly control the accounts.
The NFIU described the practice as “identity laundering”, explaining that the men may possess the ATM cards, mobile banking credentials and PINs linked to the accounts, while the women may have little or no knowledge of the transactions being conducted.
The agency said such arrangements create a layer of separation between terrorist financiers and the funds being moved, making it more difficult for law enforcement agencies to identify the actual beneficiaries.
The development has raised concerns over vulnerabilities in Nigeria’s financial identification system, particularly the relationship between SIM registration, BVN, National Identification Number (NIN) and bank account ownership.
The NFIU stressed the need for stronger identity verification and monitoring systems to close these gaps and improve the ability of financial institutions and security agencies to trace suspicious financial flows.
The agency is responsible for receiving and analysing suspicious transaction reports and disseminating financial intelligence to law enforcement, security and regulatory agencies for further investigation and possible prosecution.
