Phillip S, Is Mise & Yuyutsu
I think you are assuming a level of sophistication which would be
reasonable for state security services, but criminal and terrorist
groups will not be at that sort of level.
An FBI case in the US was just one such. They used an encryption
provided by Apple for the iPhone, but Apple could not decrypt it
because they did not have the keys.
The sort of precautions that you all suggest would no doubt be used
by state intelligence services but that is not who they are tackling.
Is Mise mentioned that the book method could use newspapers.
That would fall down if to be used internationally as a different
edition could be sold in the destination area, and if not the time for
that issue to arrive at the remote location would give a significant
delay even if available.
Interesting I just entered a phrase out of the Economist into google
and it found it in less that a second.
You have to realise of course that a newspaper is being used.
It has to be a phrase in a fixed position so there is a place in every
issue so a brute force attack would be time consuming for the first
one but from then on it would be home & hosed.
It means checking the whole magazine or paper to find that place.
Hmm, how do you find the phrase location used and what is the phrase ?
Oh well an interesting exercise. I have learnt lots.

Yuyutsu When people leak info about criminal fraud etc, the higher ups in the bank you can bet knew about it but said nothing because of the amount of money they were getting. They know who the criminals are.

German police raid Deutsche Bank over suspected money laundering

A money laundering probe stemming from the "Panama Papers" has led police to Deutsche Bank, according to authorities. Prosecutors believe the bank helped clients "transfer money from criminal activities" to tax havens.

Federal police on Thursday raided the Frankfurt offices of Deutsche Bank. The Frankfurt prosecutor's office said the raids stemmed from an investigation into suspected money laundering at the German bank.

About 170 law enforcement agents took part in the operation. The investigation revolves around multiple Deutsche Bank employees, including two believed to still be working at the financial institution.

Deutsche Bank said it was "fully cooperating" with authorities. "The case is related to the Panama Papers," a spokesperson said.

'Criminal activities'

According to prosecutors, Deutsche Bank is suspected of helping some 900 customers set up offshore shell companies in tax havens to "transfer money from criminal activities." They said some €311 million ($354 million) are believed to have been laundered, citing information gleaned from the so-called Panama Papers.

Markus Meinzer, financial secrecy director at the Tax Justice Network, told DW he was "surprised that German officials would finally take action" on information garnered from the Panama Papers.

"It has been two years that they've been analyzing these files," Meinzer said. "We have seen in other situations that German prosecutors took very long to take action" against tax avoidance schemes and financial crimes.

** Rest of story at above link - This show what I said that the banks can stop a lot of illegal things if they wanted. **

Sorry link here.

http://www.dw.com/en/german-police-raid-deutsche-bank-over-suspected-money-laundering/a-46499349

Dear Philip,

I suppose that banks indeed COULD stop a lot of illegal things if they wants, but this is not and shouldn't be their roll. What I suggested is an independent public authority that reviews transactions (as necessary) for the purpose of preventing crime and do only this, swiftly and efficiently.

Quote "What I suggested is an independent public authority that reviews transactions (as necessary) for the purpose of preventing crime and do only this, swiftly and efficiently."

I agree but see 2 problems
1 They would need access to bank data they will not give them that.
Or the banks will manipulate things to avoid reporting or hide data and transactions.

2 Where will you find honest and trustworthy people to do it?
You can bet it would not take long before politicians got involved to protect themselves or friends

Crime will not diminish as long as there's no deterrent !
If Renee Lawrence has to spend time in prison here then she'd be a perfect person to ask regarding Prison in Australia being a deterrent in comparison to Indonesia.