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Preventing Digital Payment Systems Fraud
Digital payment volumes have increased dramatically during the COVID-19 pandemic as more companies sell their products and services through digital channels. These payments have expanded to new areas, such as grocery deliveries, vacation rentals as well as automotive sales and repairs. In addition, more consumers...
Responsive Approach: Understanding Front Office Needs
In decades past, the banking industry has experienced pivotal changes in the way in which new businesses are acquired and operations conducted. The ever-increasing regulatory demands have created an inflow of risk and compliance specialists that drive the need to implement policies and procedures to...
Sanctions Targeting Russia: Parallels to Measures Against Iran
The beginning of the Russia-Ukraine war in February 2022, triggered significant sanctions by the United States (U.S.), the EU and other governments, targeting a wide range of Russian economic activities. Reports compare the current situation to the sanctions targeting Iran between the early 2000s and...
COVID-19 Pandemic Fraud: Unemployment, PPP, SBA, EIP and More
In March and April 2020, schools closed, non-essential businesses shut down and people were staying at home to stop the spread of COVID-19. The U.S. government passed several financial relief programs to assist millions of Americans affected by the COVID-19 pandemic and illicit actors were...
Ukraine, Russia and Belarus Sanctions Update
Historically, the U.S. government has taken more linear, explicitly restricted approaches to sanctions by naming known individuals, companies, vessels or underlying industries within countries subject to sanctions. Due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, there are many unknown actors and companies, in addition to the...
Collaboration: The Key Theme for the AMLA
Requirements of the Anti-Money Laundering Act of 20201 (AMLA) and other legislation will result in a dynamic change in anti-money laundering (AML) programs and subsequent controls. While most of the AMLA statutory requirements have not been finalized, Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) officers should be assessing...
Europe and the Illegal Wildlife Trade: Where Are We Now?
An elephant is poached every 30 minutes.1 An African rhino dies for its horn every eight hours.2 One in every five fish is caught illegally.3 In some African and South American countries, 50% to 90% of the wood harvested is illegally traded.4 These are illegal...
A Pandora’s Box of Money Laundering Crime
The publication of the Pandora Papers highlighted the legal loopholes and weak anti-money laundering (AML) regimes that organized criminals take advantage of across the globe. Fourteen months ago, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) Files were published, which demonstrated the systemic problems in how financial...
Cayman Islands: Improving FATF’s AML Compliance Rating
In December 2017, the Cayman Islands went through its Fourth Round Mutual Evaluation, a report that analyzed the level of compliance with international standards on combatting money laundering as well as the financing of terrorism and proliferation. The evaluation was conducted by the Caribbean Financial...