One of the programs of the United States government, created to track down terrorists and those fund them, can frighten customers unnecessarily.  The critics of the suspicious activity report claim that those who are conducting legitimate transactions are being victimized by the financial institutions.  They claim that the paperwork created by the filing of the reports is useless and is burdensome to those who are employed by such institutions.  A burden with the financial cost of billions of dollars and creates work that they deem time consuming and not necessary.  The reality is that the system and the procedures that are required, are ways in which the funding of terrorists and the crime of laundering money are detected.  Another aspect that has people frightened is that is against the law for those filing the reports to inform those about which the report is being filed against.

Reports are generated when activities take place that are considered to be not of ordinary circumstances.  If they are transactions that the customer is not usually known to make, the personnel is required to file a report.  This can be related to being pulled over due to a traffic violation.  A law enforcement officer may see a driver weaving and having difficulty controlling their vehicle.  The may pull the driver over under the suspicion that the driver is impaired, when in fact perhaps the steering or the transmission of the care has gone out.  When the facts are uncovered the truth is revealed.  The Suspicious Activity Report is extremely regulated.  If no crime is being committed, evidence will be gathered that supports that innocence.  People who are truly doing nothing wrong, need not be nervous or afraid.  These reports have resulted in the interruption of funding for those who were intending not only crimes that break the laws of the nation, but crimes against humanity without regards to moral or ethical action.