Do you really Know Your Customer? Dossiers ensures that you do.
Anagha Smrithi
Bridging The Gap:
The need to keep up with strict AML (anti-money-laundering) regulations is often challenging for financial institutions. Consistently steering clear of regulatory fines can become costly, demanding and time intensive. A new Sri-Lankan start-up called Dossiers recognizes this challenge and offers a comprehensive risk-mitigation solution.
Dossiers is an Anti-Money Laundering and Compliance Toolkit. It helps financial institutions and other regulated industries identify high-risk customers and comply with Central Bank and FIU regulations and guidelines. Powered by Artificial Intelligence, Dossiers successfully bridges the gap between AML regulations and the technology available to enforce it.
How It Works:
The new toolkit provides robust and context-driven data for South Asia, where data has historically been sparse. With Dossiers, financial institutions and regulators can now better serve people in these areas and combat risk more effectively. From sanctions screening to combing through criminal databases, Dossiers supports institutions through multiple steps of the compliance process.
Moreover, it uses AI to identify and extract information about high risk customers, including Politically Exposed Persons (PEPs.) Co-founder Ishan Marikar notes that what sets Dossiers apart is how it ‘gather[s] data from a vast variety of data sources and use[s] AI to structure it and present valuable insights about customers.’ With technology like this, it becomes possible to know one’s customers at an extremely granular level.
The team behind Dossiers also offers a unique understanding of data, having previously founded Watchdog, a fact-checking and data journalism organization. According to data scientist and Dossiers co-founder, Yudhanjaya Wijeratne, this experience in fact-checking was central: ‘Because of Watchdog, we could identify data sources in South Asia, who the key players are and how structures of power work. We are part of OCCRP (Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project) and other investigative networks around the world, so we go where the data takes us.’
The Future With Dossiers:
A tool like Dossiers has implications at a national level. Non-compliance with AML regulations can lead to significant fines and increased monitoring from organizations like FATF (Financial Action Task Force. Sri Lanka was identified as a ‘grey list’ country by the FATF in 2011 and 2017, which impacted the national financial systems. ‘As a country, we need better regulation enforcement to promote transparency,’ adds co-founder Nisal Periyapperuma. Dossiers will enable institutions to assert their commitment to anti-money-laundering at a national scale. For the average person, this could even lead to more efficient banking experiences on an everyday basis.
Currently, the team behind Dossiers has partnered with risk-analytics company Forestpin, as they enter into conversations with financial institutions. They are also looking forward to gathering more diverse data sources and scaling up Dossiers to serve new markets.
If you are interested in using Dossiers, visit https://www.dossiers.wiki/ to book a demo and get started.
Anagha Smrithi is a freelance writer and researcher. She has an MA in Media & Cultural Studies from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. Currently, she works as an editorial assistant at the Journal of Creative Communications, Ahmedabad.
