By Bastian Obermayer, Frederik Obermaier
Largest leak exposes offshore secrecy
Subject
Themes
Late one evening in early 2015, an anonymous source calling themselves John Doe contacts Bastian Obermayer of the Suddeutsche Zeitung with a simple question: "Interested in data?" What follows is the largest leak in the history of journalism: 2.6 terabytes, 11.5 million documents from the internal servers of Mossack Fonseca, a Panamanian law firm that has spent four decades selling anonymous shell companies to anyone willing to pay a few hundred dollars. The data covers 214,000 offshore companies, complete with passport scans, bank statements, email chains and the names of hidden beneficial owners.
Late one evening in early 2015, an anonymous source calling themselves John Doe contacts Bastian Obermayer of the Suddeutsche Zeitung with a simple question: "Interested in data?" What follows is the largest leak in the history of journalism: 2.6 terabytes, 11.5 million documents from the internal…
The Panama Papers emerged at a moment when public trust in financial institutions had already been severely damaged. The 2008 global financial crisis exposed reckless behaviour by major banks, yet few executives faced criminal prosecution. The Occupy Wall Street movement of 2011 crystallised…
The offshore system operates through an elegant architecture of concealment that has evolved over decades. At its foundation sits a simple legal principle: a company registered in one jurisdiction can own assets, hold bank accounts and enter contracts in another, while its true owner remains…
Mossack Fonseca maintained an elaborate compliance department, conducted routine due diligence checks, and subscribed to expensive databases that flagged politically exposed persons and sanctioned individuals. In public statements, the firm insisted it adhered to the "highest standards" of due…
An employee glancing at a payslip sees what the state has taken and is powerless to change it. A billionaire whose dividends are paid to a shell company in the British Virgin Islands can decide for himself whether to declare those earnings. This asymmetry defines the modern offshore system. It is…
The Panama Papers required a form of journalism that had never existed at this scale. Two reporters at a Munich newspaper received 2.6 terabytes of data in a language many of them could not read, concerning transactions in jurisdictions they had never visited, involving public figures they had never…
The offshore system does not merely cost governments revenue. It erodes the foundational principle of democratic governance: that rules agreed upon collectively apply equally to all citizens. When a society's most powerful members can opt out of its laws, taxes and court rulings through the purchase…
Late one evening in early 2015, journalist Bastian Obermayer receives an encrypted message from an anonymous source calling themselves John Doe. The offer is simple: secret data. Through encrypted channels, a first sample arrives, consisting of documents from Mossack Fonseca, a Panamanian law firm…
John Doe tips off the journalists about companies connected to Syria's Assad regime. They uncover a web of Mossack Fonseca shell companies belonging to Rami Makhlouf, Assad's cousin and Syria's wealthiest man, sanctioned by the US since 2008 and the EU since 2011. Despite this, Mossfon continued…
The journalists land safely in Washington with their encrypted hard drive. At the National Press Building, they present the scale of the leak to forty journalists from around the world: 1.5 terabytes, dwarfing WikiLeaks and all previous data leaks combined. Teams form around specific investigations:…
With over 2 terabytes of data and 100 journalists across fifty countries, the investigation reveals Mossack Fonseca's secret email system: a front company called Trade Direct International, disguised as an import-export business, actually owned by Jurgen Mossack and Ramon Fonseca. Clients receive…
A German billionaire sends a panicked fax to Mossfon because he has lost the bearer share for his Bahamas shell company. Losing a bearer share effectively means losing the company, since there is no record of ownership. Mossfon issues a replacement after he signs a letter of indemnity. The data…
The data trails through one of modern China's biggest political scandals. In 2011, British businessman Neil Heywood is found dead in a Chongqing hotel. His family knew him as a teetotaller, yet the death is initially attributed to alcohol. Heywood was a close friend of rising politician Bo Xilai and…
Some trails lead to dead ends. The Kirchner case yields no smoking gun despite months of work. The Gaddafi trail proves equally frustrating: former associate Ali Dabaiba appears connected to shell companies through a front man named Riad G., who books five rooms at Geneva's Grand Hotel Kempinski but…
The 2.6 terabytes of leaked data reveal a system where virtually any law can be circumvented through combinations of shell companies across multiple jurisdictions. Experts propose two concrete solutions: a global automatic exchange of bank account information, and a transparent public register…
By Bastian Obermayer, Frederik Obermaier
Subject
Themes
Late one evening in early 2015, an anonymous source calling themselves John Doe contacts Bastian Obermayer of the Suddeutsche Zeitung with a simple question: "Interested in data?" What follows is the largest leak in the history of journalism: 2.6 terabytes, 11.5 million documents from the internal servers of Mossack Fonseca, a Panamanian law firm that has spent four decades selling anonymous shell companies to anyone willing to pay a few hundred dollars. The data covers 214,000 offshore companies, complete with passport scans, bank statements, email chains and the names of hidden beneficial owners.