Weaponised Debanking, Suzie Dawson and the UK Canary
The de-banking of the Canary is a warning. If they can silence us, they can silence anyone.
Without a bank account, a media outlet cannot pay staff, process subscriptions, receive donations, or pay its bills. De-banking is not just closing an account — it is the power to destroy an organisation financially, to starve it of oxygen, and to silence its voice without ever having to win an argument.
The hypocrisy is astounding. When billionaire plaything Nigel Farage had his Coutts account questioned, the political and media establishment erupted in outrage. Heads rolled, inquiries were launched, and protections were promised.
Yet when socialist, anti-war, or pro-justice outlets face the same fate, there is barely a murmur in Westminster or the BBC.
Muslim communities, Palestine campaigners, and left-wing grassroots groups have been de-banked for years with little recourse or public sympathy.
The message is unambiguous: right-wing dissent is treated as a civil liberty, left-wing critique is treated as a risk to be eliminated.
Lloyds is not a neutral service provider. It is a massive corporate institution with its own political and economic interests — deeply embedded in the same financial and political elite that the Canaryregularly investigates and criticises.
The Canary
The Canary is a great left wing blog in the UK, The Daily Blog links to them in our international feeds because they do some amazing journalism and staunch left wing opinions.
This week, they were ‘debanked’ by Lloyds. The Canary suspects the shutdown may be tied to its pro-Palestine and anti-Zionist editorial stances.
The Canary are not anti-semitic, they criticise Israel for despicable war crimes that boarder on the threshold of genocide, but the manner in which pro-Zionist apologists can now influence banks to debunk critics is becoming the new free speech war.
In the UK right now, you can be arrested for simply saying ‘Palestine Action’. The majority of political prisoners in UK prisons now are environmentalists and pro Palestine.
But it’s not just The Canary facing weaponised debanking.
Dissident Kiwi Tech Disrupter and solo mum from Birkdale – Susie Dawson, has been debanked by KiwiBank and has exposed a conflict of interest deep inside the Banking Ombudsman that demands scrutiny.
Suzie Dawson, is fighting KiwiBank from de-banking her because Banks have become a weapon against those the State actively seeks to disenfranchise.
Suzie Dawson doesn’t put up with getting bullied, here’s what happened in Iceland when the Banks attempted to de-bank her company there…
It is difficult to know which came first: the chicken or the egg.
In September of 2022, our USD$1 million seed funding was frozen without notice and withheld from us, by Islandsbanki, a major Icelandic bank. Talk Liberation’s data operations and hosting are in Iceland, because Iceland has special constitutional protections for freedom of information and freedom of speech, and data centres in Iceland are powered by 100% green, renewable geothermal and hydroelectric energy.
The bank invoked “anti-money laundering and counter terrorist-funding” legislation to justify the freezing, and then closed our accounts. But then, in a stunning reversal, they unfroze our funds – but without apology, explanation or compensation. Of course, the unfreezing of the funds completely exonerated us from wrongdoing. But it was too late – the damage was already done. Strategic plans that we had spent months working on had gone out the window – hiring couldn’t proceed, strategic partnerships had to be delayed. And our community suffered fear, uncertainty and doubt as time ticked on.
In March of 2023, we began preparing a legal case against the bank.
While we don’t question the rights of banks to freeze funds in certain circumstances, we absolutely are requiring that they be held to account for the abuses of process that occurred, the lack of transparency or customer care and for the damages and costs that were inflicted upon our business.
It was ultimately nine months before we received our investment funds back.
Our lawsuit is progressing with the help of Icelandic lawyers who won a USD$10 million settlement for WikiLeaks against a payment processor acting on instructions from Visa and Mastercard. With their help, we are currently suing Islandsbanki in Icelandic Courts for wrongfully withholding our investment funds. More info about that can be found here: https://badbanki.com
…Suzie doesn’t put up with bullying.
Suzie left NZ after intense scrutiny from Intelligence Agencies for her roles in the #GCSB Mass Surveillance protests, as well as being a co-creator of the viral hashtag #TPPANoWay, and an activist, journalist and/or promoter of other major events across the 2010s including #NZ4Gaza, Aotearoa is Not For Sale and the Moment of Truth event featuring Kim Dotcom, Glenn Greenwald, Edward Snowden and Julian Assange.
Suzie’s journalism and activism was shared many times by WikiLeaks and Julian Assange, among others. In 2018 she founded #Unity4J, a large international movement in support of the WikiLeaks publisher.
Suzie is on record as early as 2012 reporting on Thompson Clark Investigations Limited (TCIL) being involved in targeting activists – which she was very much vindicated about in the 2018 State Services Commission Report.
I worked directly with Suzie in 2012-2014 and she was tenacious and impactful. As well as being an activist, she also wrote articles highly critical of the entire Dirty Politics cabal – particularly Judith Collins and John Key. She feared with some justification of being on an ‘Enemies List of the State’ and felt following in the footsteps of other whistleblowers and at-risk activists was the smartest move for her and her young family. Ultimately, she sought, as Snowden had, asylum in Russia and remains there.
She was elected Leader in Exile of the Internet Party in 2017.
She now runs a successful global Internet Business, retains her citizenship and continues to use her KiwiBank account set up here and managed for her personal and business matters.
Until last year when she was debanked.
Debanking was supposed to be aimed at despots and criminal cartels circumventing international law, it’s now being used against anyone who angers the State.
That is a terribly dangerous precedent to make.
Independent Media is more important than ever, especially in the lead up to the Election. TDB is the largest Left Wing Blog in NZ and we have been operating for 13 years now. We get zero funding g from NZ on Air and we don’t have no rich backers. If you can donate please do so here or directly into our account – 12-3065-0133561-56
“She now runs a successful global Internet Business”
She raised money for a social media platform that never eventuated, was never trialed or used or even cited by anyone outside the scam.
Its only a matter of time. Every single person with an interest in politics risks being debanked. The powers that be – the billionaire class – that have captured politics – have their own plans in mind. Plans that benefit them at the expense of everyone else. You think neoliberal economic policy is a problem, huh, that’s just child’s play. Their plans will be the ruin of us all. Anyone that gets in their way, as in awakes thousands of people to rally against their plans, will be debanked among a host of other punitive measures they have constructed in order to ensure that no one gets in the way of their goals. Oh, the joy of a billionaire class led, deconstructed world that awaits us all. “Build back better” merely a tiny hint of what they wish to do to the world before they reconstruct it to suit their plans.
I was de-banked by ANZ. They could not compute my generosity so they assumed I was doing something dodgy. I was simply helping out poor people directly through the internet.
They sent me “we will not be offering banking service to you ever”. I said WTF? they sent me a twenty page doc to fill in for Enhance Security -( You must fill this in in 7 days) . By the time they offered an option I was half way through joining Kiwi Bank.
Even though I banked with these fascists all my adult life and bought 3 properties with them, they could not give a F about a little customer like me.
Avoid ANZ!