BY PAUL O’DONOGHUE, Senior Correspondent
The UK is considering changing the threshold for when banks would file suspicious transactions, one of the country’s leading AML figures has said.
Adrian Searle, director of the National Economic Crime Centre.(NECC) at the National Crime Agency, said there is currently a sense from many analysts that many SARs (suspicious activity reports) are not useful.
“We’re looking at the SARs regime, the guidance we’ve given on what needs to be reported as a SAR,” he told the ‘International Anti-Financial Crime Summit 2024’ in London.
“We’re looking at whether we should change the threshold for suspicion, as we want to have the most impact. And there is a suspicion that some of the things being reported on aren’t adding value.”
Many financial institutions currently use transaction monitoring software which flag thousands of SARs every year.
Typically, only a tiny fraction of these, around 5%, are ever pursued by regulators or law enforcement.
As well as saying that SARs must become more effective, Searle also warned about increasing levels of ‘digitally enabled fraud’.
“We’re seeing uses of AI where you have the likes of Nigerian fraudsters using face-swapping technology,” he said.
He also pointed to the rise of deepfakes – videos which feature a digitally-altered likeness of a person.
London-based company Arup recently confirmed it was the victim of a deepfake scam in Hong Kong.after an employee was duped into sending HK$200 million ($25 million) to criminals by an artificial intelligence-generated video call.
“This is happening. It’s not yet at great scale, but it’s happening,” Searle said.
Searle also referenced figures recently published by the NCA which found that the UK is likely one of the world’s leading money laundering hubs, with as much as £100 million in illicit finance shifted through the nation.
“We’re looking at, at least £100 billion laundered in the UK every year,” he said. “We also have losses to individuals and businesses of £2 billion every year, which I think is probably a massive under-estimate.”
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