We talked to E. Jay Saunders, chairman and CEO of Domus Semo Sancus (DSS), about the challenges of KYC And AML and the DSS SafteyNet.ai regtech solution, ahead of tomorrow’s A-Team Group RegTech Summit for Capital Markets in New York. At the event, Saunders will join a panel of expert speakers that will discuss how to apply innovative technologies to manage risk and improve onboarding, KYC and AML.
Q: What does RegTech mean to you?
A: Technologies that are primarily designed to help entities meet obligations and requirements set by the regulator of the industry for which they provide products and services, particularly within the financial services industry.
Q: What regulations are of primary concern to you and your customers?
A: Know Your Customer (KYC) and anti-money laundering regulations.
Q: What problem do financial institutions have that you believe you can solve?
A: We can help clients know their potential client – KYC – at a level whereby they can get an in-depth understanding of the potential risk that those clients may represent.
Q: Why do they have this problem?
A: KYC is a recommendation of the Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering (FATF) and is a requirement set by local regulators to combat the financing of terrorism, money laundering, and other exploits of the global financial system.
Q: How do you solve the problem?
A: Through a combination of the largest datasets of global sanctions lists, watch lists, and persons in public life lists, and customised crawlers that monitor thousands of global feeds in real time including those that contain biographies, global addresses, business dealings, court records, criminal registries, government records, gazettes, curated news, leaked files (like. The Panama Papers), and others.
The data is managed by an artificial intelligence (AI) engine that uses natural language processing and machine learning to gain insights into the data and to understand the relevance and context of each piece of information based on an industry-specific taxonomy. When an enhanced due diligence search is performed on a subject of interest, the AI engine pulls all the information it has gathered on the subject – from within the surface, deep and dark web, and within an organisation’s internal data – and that it deems relevant to the end user.
The information is sorted and categorised by information type. For select types of information, the AI engine provides on-the-fly insights and connections pulled from specific pieces of data during document deep dives. During the enhanced due diligence check, the end user can accept or reject the findings of the AI engine and can also add his or her own insights and notes to the final profile report.
Q: What technology do you use?
A: We use IBM Watson, Amazon Web Services, BlueMix, Drupal, Solr, and others.
Q: How do you fit into a financial institution’s architecture and data flows?
A: We fit in when a firm is performing customer onboarding and when its doing a regular review of a client’s file.
Q: What other cool RegTech companies have you seen out there?
A: IBM and LexisNexis.
Q: Why are you taking part in A-Team’s RegTech Summit for Capital Markets event?
A: To meet other players in the market and help my product, SafetyNet.ai, gain top-of-mind interest with attendees at the Summit.
Q: What type of people are you hoping to meet at the Summit?
A: People whose organisations are required by the regulator to perform enhanced due diligence checks on potential clients, as well as people from organisations who cannot afford to make a mistake and do business with entities that may result in a fine to the organisation or a negative hit on the organisation’s reputation.
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