Swift has announced the launch of ‘sanctions screening’, a centralised service for small and medium-sized financial institutions in need of a cost-effective, easy route to comply with sanctions regulations.

The Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (Swift) developed the service to help the community keep up with increasing regulatory obligations.

The service combines FircoSoft’s market-leading filtering application and list update service with the security and resilience of Swift to provide a reliable service that helps financial institutions comply with the sanctions laws under which they operate, a statement from Swift said.

Brigitte De Wilde, head of AML and sanctions initiatives, Swift, said: “Our industry is faced with increasing regulatory demands that prove a heavy burden on operational costs. Swift is committed to helping our customers reduce cost and increase operational efficiency.”

“Our new service offers a straightforward ‘subscribe and comply’ solution. Through our collaboration with FircoSoft for the sanctions filter and lists, we are able to offer a best-in-class service and take away the hassle of updating lists in back-office systems,” he said.

Users will be able to request selected Swift FIN messages be routed to the centralised screening application, where they will be filtered in real time, and checked against customers’ selected sanctions lists.

If there is no match to the sanctions list, the message will be delivered as usual. If there is a match, customers will be asked to instruct Swift as to whether to release, block or flag the message via an alert management system. – TradeArabia News Service