Bernhard Warner
LONDON: Swiss bank UBS AG said on Monday it would use a British technology
firm's artificial intelligence software to monitor all banking transactions in a
bid to thwart money laundering.
Banks have faced mounting pressure from politicians and law enforcement
authorities to crack down on money laundering in the wake of last September's
attacks in the United States. In January, a dozen of the world's largest
financial institutions, including UBS, pledged to clamp down on funds that could
be used to finance groups with violent aims.
As a result, banks have stepped up investment in anti-money laundering
measures, and many of them are increasingly turning to the latest technology to
automate the process. "UBS decided to enhance its transaction monitoring to
better address the rapidly changing banking demands we are experiencing
worldwide," Hans-Peter Bauer, chief risk officer of UBS Switzerland, said
in a statement.
UBS hired Searchspace, a London-based technology firm that has developed
technology, which can pinpoint suspect transactions within vast data flows for
financial institutions. The London Stock Exchange, for example, uses
Searchspace's artificial intelligence software, dubbed Intelligence Enterprise
Framework, to detect particular market abuses, such as insider trading and share
price ramping activities.
UBS, which logs millions of transactions per day, will deploy Searchspace's
digital anti-money laundering sentinels to flag suspicious movements of funds
through the bank. Searchspace Chief Executive Jason Kingdon explained the
software will tag any anomalous transactions by UBS customers and report them to
bank authorities.
The software, he said, compares a particular transaction with the customer's
past transactions and the transactions of a peer group of customers to determine
if, say a withdrawal of $10,000, is worthy of further review.
"It's not about trying to turn the organisation into a customer
transaction investigation unit," said Kingdon. "It's about trying to
manage risk."