Inside a drab one-story office building in Post Falls, Idaho, a little-known American company has built the machinery that enables hundreds of thousands of businesses to operate in near-total secrecy.
The company, Registered Agents Inc., is a one-stop shop for people seeking to incorporate a business in any US state, often in those with advantageous tax policies, while obscuring their identities. According to five former employees of Registered Agents Inc. or its subsidiaries, the company routinely incorporates thousands of businesses on behalf of its customers using fake personas. Former Registered Agents Inc. employees say that the company's widespread use of personas is an outgrowth of its founder's obsession with privacy and a desire to push the boundaries of incorporation laws.
Experts say a lack of adequate federal and state regulations of registered agents helps to make the United States a hotbed for money-laundering and other shady business dealings.
