SWIFT search worked around State Department
Conspicuously absent in the SWIFT caper was any mention of State.
According to State, its Office of the Coordinator for Counterterrorism is charged with directing, managing, and coordinating all U.S. agencies’ efforts to develop and provide counter-terrorism financing programs. here Treasury notified the central banks of Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland and Japan about the programme, but not the governments, where State would play a role. here

Swift was exempt.
Data from the Brussels-based banking consortium, formally known as the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, has allowed officials from the C.I.A., the Federal Bureau of Investigation and other agencies to examine "tens of thousands" of financial transactions

Treasury officials said Swift was exempt from American laws restricting government access to private financial records because the cooperative was considered a messaging service, not a bank or financial institution.here graphic In a statement, SWIFT said it "responded to compulsory subpoenas for limited sets of data from the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the United States Department of the Treasury. here