Adverse media & sanctions screening

Screen a namebefore you onboard.

Two layers: a match against consolidated global sanctions & PEP lists, and a scan of public news for adverse coverage — fraud, money laundering, bribery, sanctions, enforcement. Same-name articles about other people are filtered out, and a name-only sanctions hit is flagged possible, never confirmed. A screening signal to review — not a verdict.

How it works

About adverse media & sanctions screening

Adverse media and sanctions screening checks a person or organisation across two independent layers. The first is a deterministic match against consolidated global sanctions & PEP data: it is corroboration-gated, so a name-only hit is reported as “possible”, never confirmed, while a matching date of birth or country promotes it to a “strong” match. When many uncorroborated hits land at once, a common-name-ambiguity flag fires so a frequent name isn’t mistaken for a single person.

The second layer is an entity-disambiguated pass over public news and web sources that classifies adverse coverage — fraud, money laundering, bribery, sanctions, enforcement, and the like — and filters out same-name people, surfacing those separately as “excluded”. Either way this reports screening coverage, not a determination: a hit means “review”, not “guilty”, and “nothing found” is not a clean record.

  1. 01

    Identify the subject

    Give a name and, optionally, a date of birth, country, aliases, employer, or role — or pass an identity document and a reader pulls the subject’s details from it. The extra fields sharpen matching and cut same-name noise.

  2. 02

    Match against sanctions & PEP data

    The subject is matched against consolidated global sanctions & PEP data, gated by corroboration: a name-only hit stays “possible”, while a matching date of birth or country promotes it to “strong”.

  3. 03

    Scan public news and web sources

    An entity-disambiguated pass reads public news and web coverage, classifies any adverse findings by category, and filters out articles about other people who share the name.

  4. 04

    Summarise into a risk flag

    Both layers are folded into a single risk flag and a plain-language headline, with the underlying candidates, hits, and excluded same-name results kept so you can review each one.

What you get back

Sanctions & PEP matches

Candidates split into strong vs possible matches, each tagged with its corroboration, plus a common-name-ambiguity flag when several uncorroborated hits suggest a frequent name.

Adverse media hits

Negative coverage matched to the subject with source, date, and an evidence snippet — and same-name articles about other people surfaced separately as excluded.

Categories

A breakdown of the adverse findings by type — financial crime, money laundering, bribery, sanctions, enforcement, and more.

Risk flag + headline

A single risk flag (adverse findings, possible matches, none found, or inconclusive) and a one-line headline summarising what the screen turned up.

Common uses

  • KYC/AML onboarding checks before taking on a customer
  • Periodic re-screening of an existing book to catch new exposure
  • Vendor, counterparty, or supplier due diligence
  • Pre-screening a name before committing to a manual compliance review

This reports screening coverage, not a determination — review every hit. A name-only sanctions hit is “possible”, never confirmed, and “nothing found” is not a clean record. It is not legal or compliance advice.

Questions

Does a hit mean the person is guilty or sanctioned?
No. A hit means “review”, not “guilty”. The screen reports coverage and possible exposure, not a determination. A name-only sanctions hit is flagged “possible” and is never confirmed — corroborate it with a date of birth or another identifier before acting on it.
Does “nothing found” mean the subject is clean?
No. “Nothing found” reflects the coverage searched, not a clean record. Sources are incomplete and a subject may simply not appear in them, so absence of findings is not a clearance.
How do you handle people with the same name?
Two ways. Sanctions matching is corroboration-gated, so a name-only hit stays “possible” until a date of birth or country promotes it. The news pass is entity-disambiguated and filters out same-name articles about other people, surfacing them separately as “excluded”.
What can I give it to identify the subject?
A name on its own works, and you can add a date of birth, country, aliases, employer, or role to cut same-name false matches. You can also pass an identity document, and a reader will pull the subject’s details from it.
Do you store anything?
No. Screening is stateless — the subject you submit is screened and not retained.

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