Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. formed a unit to investigate illegal financial activities and work with the Internal Revenue Service, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. Secret Service.

Twenty analysts assigned to the Financial Intelligence Unit will track financial crimes by reviewing data from banking, regulatory, law enforcement and open-source data and refer potential cases to Vance’s Major Economic Crimes Bureau, under which the new unit operates, Vance said today in a statement. The unit will also specialize in coordinating with outside agencies.

“As financial information has made the leap from ledger books to online sources, this new unit will be tasked with making sure these sets of data are analyzed, which will enhance our prosecutions of everything from classic white-collar crimes to street crimes to cybercrime,” Vance said in the statement.

The Major Economic Crimes Bureau’s unit for looking at suspicious activity, formed in November 2010, has reviewed thousands of filings that have given investigative leads, Vance’s office said. The new unit will cooperate with federal authorities or other district attorneys’ offices in situations where jurisdictional issues prevent Vance’s office from bringing a case, according to the statement.

“Working with the FIU provides additional opportunities for local, state and federal agencies to join forces and combat financial crime,” Richard Weber, the IRS’s chief of criminal investigation, said in the statement.