The Special Investigation Commission (SIC) against money laundering and terrorism financing issued its annual report detailing its activities about tracing money generated from illegal activities in Lebanon in 2018. Established by Banque du Liban as an independent legal entity, the SIC's mandate is to investigate suspected money-laundering operations and to monitor compliance with the rules and procedures of Law 318, the anti-money laundering law that was enacted by the Lebanese Parliament in April 2001 and that was replaced by Law 44 in November 2015.

The report indicated that the SIC received 489 suspected cases in 2018. It received 398 cases, or 81.4% of the total, from local sources, and 91 cases, or 18.6% from international sources. In turn, the SIC referred 168 suspected cases to the judicial authorities, while 74 cases are still pending and the remaining 247 cases did not fall within the framework of Law 44. Further, authorities lifted the banking secrecy on 30 cases, with six of those cases referred from foreign governments and organizations and 24 cases from domestic sources. The remaining 138 cases were related to information requests. Overall, the SIC investigated 415 out of 489 cases, or 84.9% of the total in 2018, relative to 86.1% of suspected cases in 2017, 84.9% of cases in 2016, 77.5% of cases in 2015, 73.6% of cases in 2014, 84.7% of cases in 2013 and 67.3% of cases in 2012.

Cybercrime accounted for 25.1% of the cases that the SIC received in 2018; followed by counterfeiting & forgery with 20.8%; narcotics trafficking with 6.1%; terrorism and terrorism financing with 5.1%; fraud with 4.6%; corruption with 4.4%; embezzlement of private funds with 2.5%; tax evasion with 2.3%; the use of insider information with 1.3%; smuggling with 1.1%; and organized crimes, sexual exploitation, murder and illegal arms trade with 0.2% each; while the remaining 26% of cases did not fall under a specific category.