International bank Standard Chartered is to deploy financial crime and compliance software from Dublin-based tech firm Norkom as part of a global programme to enhance regulatory compliance and anti-money laundering risk management.
It is understood Norkom’s anti-money laundering and watch list management solutions are to be installed across the bank’s operations in more than 50 countries on four continents to provide transaction monitoring and real-time sanctions filtering. Norkom’s solutions will help Standard Chartered to detect, analyse, intercept and report suspicious and criminal activity.
“Standard Chartered will use the Norkom solution to protect its world-class reputation and to meet its regulatory commitments — all under a single infrastructure,” explained Norkom CEO Paul Kerley. “Our solution’s ability to reduce the incidence of crime by up to 70pc and to reduce the operational cost of investigations by up to 300pc has already been proven in other implementations; we look forward to delivering the same benefits to Standard Chartered.”
The Norkom solution will monitor banking transactions, both in real-time and batch mode, to identify suspicious behaviour. Alerts, prioritised in terms of importance and fully populated with all necessary information, will then be issued to Standard Chartered’s analyst teams for investigation.
The Norkom solution will also monitor the bank’s transactions against various watch lists that have been established, both by the bank and by the regulatory authorities in each country. It will immediately identify transactions to or from individuals, organisations or countries that are viewed as high risk, prioritising investigations so that the bank can focus its attention first on those that represent the greatest risk.
Andrew Hunter, group head of compliance and regulatory risk at Standard Chartered, explained: “As an international bank, we need systems and procedures that support our high standards so that we only do business with reputable individuals and entities. Failure to do so poses a risk to our business and reputation, and also to the communities in which we operate.
“It is the flexibility and functionality of the product that attracted us,” said Hunter. “It’s a single solution that allows us to manage our risk globally, yet can be configured for specific in-country requirements, and allows us to achieve economies of scale, streamline our compliance procedures and help protect our business across the globe.”
By John Kennedy
