Human rights approach

Technology-enabled abuse is increasingly recognised as a feature of human impact crimes, particularly where perpetrators exploit digital channels to continue coercive, threatening or controlling behaviour. In practical terms, technology gives perpetrators another avenue to reach vulnerable people, including where traditional communication channels have been blocked or limited. This can include the misuse of online platforms, mobile services, digital accounts and payment systems to stalk, intimidate, harass or exert control over a victim-survivor.

Within a financial services context, this abuse can present through the use of transaction descriptions, small-value payments, repeated transfers or other account behaviours that are designed primarily to deliver a harmful message or maintain unwanted contact. What may appear on its face to be a routine transaction can, in reality, carry significant human impact where the narrative attached to the payment is abusive, threatening or coercive. For vulnerable customers, this can reinforce fear, reduce their sense of safety and demonstrate that the perpetrator is able to continue exerting control through systems intended for legitimate financial activity.

Criminals and perpetrators continue to adapt their methods developing increasingly sophisticated ways to misuse legitimate financial products and digital channels to facilitate harm. As these typologies continue to evolve, NAB's financial crime response must also continue to evolve through ongoing enhancement of detection capabilities, intelligence-led monitoring, operational processes and cross-functional collaboration to identify emerging risks and better protect vulnerable customers.

NAB has been working to strengthen the identification of financial abuse through improved detection of transaction-based abuse and narrative abuse, including the misuse of payment description fields. This work recognises that financial crime typologies are not limited to traditional proceeds-of-crime activity but can also include behaviours that cause direct harm to individuals and communities. Better identification of these indicators supports earlier recognition of potential abuse, more informed escalation pathways and a stronger ability to intervene where banking products or services are being misused to harm vulnerable customers.

This capability continues to be explored and enhanced through collaboration between financial crime teams and vulnerability teams, with a shared focus on improving detection, strengthening customer protection and reducing opportunities for perpetrators to exploit financial channels. Ongoing uplift in analytics, operational processes and frontline awareness will be important to ensure that suspicious or harmful behaviours are identified in a way that is both risk-based and sensitive to customer safety.

The objective is to better protect vulnerable customers while supporting a broader organisational response to human impact crimes and technology-enabled abuse.

NAB regularly assists state and federal law enforcement agencies (LEA) on law enforcement investigations. For example, in one matter, a review of the customer’s NAB holdings found behavioural indicators and unusual transaction patterns consistent with alleged child offending. NAB’s investigation into this customer and its intelligence sharing assisted the LEA to further its investigations.

In late 2025, NAB received a referral from a state-based law enforcement agency involving a young person suspected of online solicitation and the distribution of child exploitation material. What began as a financial review quickly revealed a far more serious and complex picture of vulnerability, coercion and exploitation.

Early analysis identified that the young person had been receiving multiple payments from an unrelated adult NAB customer. The transaction references attached to those payments raised immediate concerns, suggesting coercion, threats and sexual exploitation. At that stage, the adult customer had not been identified by police, making financial intelligence a critical starting point for further inquiry.

As NAB continued to review the adult customer’s accounts, further indicators emerged that pointed to broader criminal activity, including suspected drug dealing and fraud. The review also suggested the adult may have had control over the young person’s known contact details. On one occasion, the adult attended a NAB branch with the alleged young person who was observed with bruising to their face and neck, adding to concerns about the level of harm and control involved.

Further police inquiries established that the young person had been living away from home for two years and had become caught in a destructive situation involving illicit drugs and sexual exploitation. Police investigations ultimately identified another adult who was obtaining sexual services from the young person in exchange for illicit drugs, accommodation, transport and other material gain.

The seriousness of the matter escalated further when search warrants were executed at the adult’s home. Police located child abuse material relating to the young person, along with evidence consistent with individuals harboured in a sexual servitude-like environment. Two additional children found at the address were removed and placed into care.

The adult NAB customer first identified through financial analysis remains subject to ongoing investigative action in connection with child exploitation matters. The case highlights the important role financial intelligence can play in identifying hidden harm, surfacing indicators of exploitation and supporting law enforcement efforts to protect vulnerable people.