Investigating Money Laundering with Graph Theory: Algorithms and Treewidth in Financial Networks

Money laundering is a crime that sustains the activities of criminal organizations
by concealing the illicit origin of financial resources. This article proposes a methodology based on
Graph theory to model and analyze networks of financial transactions obtained through breaks
of banking secrecy. Algorithms are developed to detect typical washing behaviors,
such as transit accounts and recurring flows between individuals and legal entities. In addition,
If a structural study using the treewidth measure, investigating the complexity of the graphs
identifying critical points for the interruption of illicit operations. The methodology
It is validated with real data, contributing to the advancement of financial investigation techniques and
aligning with national strategic network protection guidelines.