More than $24 million was collected by 523 registered non-profit organisations in the Cayman Islands between 2019 and 2020. Of that amount, $18 million was spent locally, while half a million dollars was sent abroad to help with humanitarian efforts. The remainder of the funds has yet to be allocated by the charities.
Paul Inniss, the head of compliance at the General Registry, has warned that Cayman’s NPOs are being targeted by international fraudsters through phishing scams.
“We have noticed some trends coming out of the post-COVID pandemic, in terms of some bad actors – not within the NPO community, but individuals who are seeking to solicit funds from the NPO community,” said Inniss, while speaking on Rooster 101’s Cayman Crosstalk on 16 March.
So far, Inniss said the General Registry is not aware of any NPOs falling victim to the scams, but they have been made aware of some fraudsters claiming to be from the United Nations, which appear genuine in nature and are seeking to exploit the global COVID-19 pandemic.
“We told the [NPOs], no, no, no, the UN does not operate like that, please delete the email and move on,” said Inniss.
In response to the new generation of sophisticated scams, Inniss said his office is offering several outreach sessions which are geared towards NPOs whose staff may not have experience in financial governance.
“One of the things we must realise is that there are several NPOs on the island who have professional persons running the boards, who we don’t have to worry about,” he said. “But then we have the laymen NPOs, persons who really mean well, persons who don’t have a financial background, that we tend to put our arms around… bring them in close and provide them with the training and coach them through the process.”
He said the NPOs will be provided with best practices, record-keeping solutions and a host of templates to assist them. Spaces are currently limited to 40 people and NPOs will be emailed directly by the General Registry.
“We are going to train them, and then provide them with the resources, and thereafter we certainly will continue with our support,” said Inniss.
Outside the scope of fraud prevention, Inniss said his office was also acutely aware of the risk of terrorist financing given Cayman’s profile as an international financial centre.
The Cayman Islands Bureau of Financial Investigations said in February it has frozen $200 million and is also involved in several active cases, some involving potential financing of terrorism. Those cases are not believed to involve Cayman-based NPOs, the Registry said.
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