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Need for Identity Verification in Real Estate and Its Real-World Use Cases

Emily Daniel
November 19, 2019
5 minutes read
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The real estate industry is in dire need of identity verification processes. The reason being, the transfer, and flow of illegal money across the globe. Criminals are always on the search for opportunities that could contribute to their embezzle funds transfers. Money laundering and terrorist financing are made possible for criminals to conduct it through real estate. Fraudsters have found tricks to fool the real estate agency through which they have learned the ways to clean the ill-gotten gains before enjoying them.

Study shows that the real estate has reached to the crimes of worth $1.6 trillion annually. The lack of a monitoring system estimates this value to increase in the coming years. Here comes the need for identity verification. Identity verification of the property seller, property buyer and the entities that are offered with certificates for multiple purposes. There is a need to verify the person involved in dealing with real estate. This will reduce the chances of bad actors if they are screened through various verification parameters. This step is not as complicated as it seems. Online customer identity verification services are available which help you verify the identities in real-time providing a streamlined process.

In the past few years, the criminals have exploited the real-estate sector to launder their black money and to convert it into white money. Panama Leaks is one of the recent money laundering cases that jolted the regulatory authorities from their deep slumber regarding the need for regulatory scrutiny of the real-estate sector.

How Real-estate is exploited?

Money launderers find the least regulated regions and then launder their money to buy real-estate. Later the criminals would conduct several buying and selling transactions and incorporate the black money within the sale proceeds of the real-estate. Real-estate is exploited in the integration phase of money laundering.

Local Legislations and Real Estate

For the accurate and transparent transfers of property, local regulators are active. UK, Germany, Canada, Singapore, Australia states are all adopting efficient ways in real estate to streamline the process of customer verification. To avoid reputational damage to a company, now the organization that complies with local regimes is considered more reputable.

The UK has given the time till 2021 to the real-estate owners to get registered with the concerned authority. So it’ll filter out the money launderers. The registers of real-estate owners will be shared with the public. So, businesses will have the ability to identify criminals among the legitimate sellers of real-estate.

By implementing an Electronic Verification System (EVS), real estate agencies can deter the risks of fraud. It is important to screen the customers against electronic databases that contain the lists of exposed persons either they are money launderers, politically exposed or terrorists. These updated lists would help in verifying the identity in seconds. It is a smart way to protect your real estate business from criminals.

Use Cases of Identity Verification In Real Estate

To strengthen the overall dynamic security measures, it is important to integrate digital identity verification services with the system. This verification system authenticates the customer based on several supporting shreds of evidence that could be official identity cards, bank accounts, and other documents. The following are some of the use-cases that are covered in real estate by identity verification.

Customer Due Diligence

Identity verification is mandatory to perform Customer Due Diligence (CDD) and Enhanced Due Diligence (EDD) processes in the system to verify the customers against strict verification checks. This step serves the purpose when it comes to avoiding illicit funds transfers.

High-risk Transactions

Money launderers have smart tricks to transfer money across the world. It gets hard to track the path of money flow and to differentiate dirty and clean money. Real estate can verify each of its customers before proceeding with any transaction. The property documents should be verified to make sure that it is coming from an honest entity.

Updated Criminal Databases

Identity verification API collaborates with the updated criminal records against which identities are verified. These criminal records include the list of politically exposed personalities, money launderers, cybercriminals, terrorists and similar entities. Against these sanction lists, each entity is screened to make sure that onboarding identity has not been a part of any criminal activity before or currently.

Compliance Requirements

Local regulators have proposed serious laws regarding identity verification of the customers. These laws came into effect as a result of criminal activities through real estate in various areas of the world. To avoid regulatory penalties, it is important to comply with the requirements of compliances strictly.

To wrap up, real-estate has a huge growth potential that will not tarnish with time but will enhance. The criminals are exploiting this sector for long. But now the regulatory authorities require this sector to practice customer due diligence on their buyers and sellers. It’ll reduce criminal exploitation of this sector.

Digital identity verification and KYC screening of customers will help real-estate businesses to gain global risk cover against financial criminals.

Disclaimer: No warranty is herein provided that the information contained in this document is accurate, up-to-date, and/or complete. In no circumstance(s), does such information constitute legal or any other advice. Any person who intends to use, rely, pass-on, or re-publish the information contained herein in any way is solely responsible for the same. We suggest to verify the information and/or obtain expert advice independently if required.

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Record-Breaking Fines on Banks for KYC/AML Non-Compliance
How Real-estate is exploited?
Know Your Customer (KYC) and Anti-Money Laundering (AML) compliance have been structured to make financial institutions secure. The rising number of illegal activities in the finance sector is raising concerns for regulatory authorities. This year, the KYC/AML regulations have become more rigid and different countries have also amended their state laws for customer due diligence. Why are all the regulatory authorities imposing more stringent laws in 2021?

In 2020, the majority of banks were fined for not complying with KYC/AML regulations. The law violations increased significantly and record-breaking penalties were imposed on banks across the globe. This led law enforcement agencies to make certain changes to the regulations and customer due diligence protocols. The record-breaking penalties in the finance sector have changed the game for businesses.

Let’s take a deep dive into the largest penalties of 2020 and how can KYC/AML regulations help the finance sector to avoid them in 2021.

How to Comply with KYC/AML Regulations?

Compliance with KYC/AML regulations require robust Anti-Money Laundering (AML) screening and Know Your Customer (KYC) identity verification measures. These measures verify the identity of every customer and ensure that legitimate customers are onboarded. With the help of document verification and biometric authentication, it gets easier to follow the laws.
Recommended: The Future of Customer Onboarding Post-COVID-19 Pandemic

A Summary of 2020 Bank Fines

2020 brought several inconveniences to life and the most distressing challenge was fighting fraudsters. Identity theft and money laundering were the most reported crimes last year. Unfortunately, the inability of financial institutions to verify identities of customers increased money laundering and other illegal activities. Here is a summary of fines imposed in 2020:

Goldman Sachs Tops the List

The US was ranked number 1 with the highest number of bank fines enforced in 2020. 12 cases of AML non-compliance were reported and the sum of all these fines was €9.39 billion. The fine on Goldman Sachs alone was €3.30 billion. The settlement was made by the bank with Malaysia against the Wall Street Bank for its role in assisting to raise millions for a sovereign wealth fund.

Commerzbank Fined £37.8 Million by FCA

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) imposed a £37.8 Million fine on the Commerzbank, London. The fine was a result of the bank’s violation of AML controls. According to reports of FCA, the violations will result in huge risks and stability issues of the UK’s financial system. The audit from FCA shared the following reasons on the basis of which the bank was penalised:

Periodic due diligence failures

Insufficient money laundering control procedures

Inadequate risk management systems

Westpac Paid $1.3 Billion for AML Breaches

Last year, Westpac bank in Australia was number 5 on the list of banks with the highest penalties. The court penalised Westpac with a fine of $1.3 billion. AML laws were breached at different intervals. Westpac not only violated AML/CFT laws but also failed to employ transaction monitoring and did not submit IFTI reports to AUSTRAC. Furthermore, the bank did not perform enhanced due diligence for high-risk transactions as suggested by FATF.

SEB Bank Fined $107 Million for Poor AML Measures

Next in the list of KYC/AML non-compliance is Lloyds Bank that was fined $107 million by the City watchdog for unfair treatment of mortgage customers. According to the executive director of enforcement and market oversight of Financial Conduct Authority (FCA),

“Banks are required to treat customers fairly, even when those customers are in financial difficulties or are having trouble meeting their obligations. By not sufficiently understanding their customers’ circumstances the banks risked treating unfairly more than a quarter of a million customers in mortgage arrears.”

Reasons Behind Hefty Penalties on Banks

The major reason behind all these hefty penalties is the banks’ inability to follow the regulations imposed by higher authorities. However, there are several other reasons resulting in increasing fines and growing rigidity of regulations. They include,

Consistent failures to comply with the Anti-Money Laundering laws

Lack of proper customer due diligence

No transaction monitoring measures taken

Overseen cases of compliance monitoring

Did you know that the highest number of cases of AML law violations have been reported in 2020? Here’s an overview of the number of cases reported last year:

82 cases of transaction monitoring

109 cases of poor AML compliance

115 cases of lack of customer due diligence

If banks continue to lack robust verification and AML systems, the numbers will increase this year as well.

Suggested: A Comprehensive Guide to AML Compliance [2020]

What Can You Do to Prevent Fines in 2021?

Other enterprises in the finance sector must comply with the KYC/AML regulations at all costs. Otherwise, heavy penalties will be their fate in 2021 as well. How can banks and other financial enterprises prevent fines this year? Well, here’s what you should do:

Take a look at the amended laws from regulatory authorities

Audit your current identity verification protocols

Ensure robust KYC/AML compliance measures within the company

Never onboard any customer without verification

Always perform enhanced due diligence (EDD) checks for high-risk customers

Ongoing transaction monitoring must be employed to prevent money laundering

Read more: Shufti Pro’s Ongoing AML Solution to Prevent Transaction Laundering

How Can Shufti Pro Help You?

Penalties on financial institutions are increasing every year and 2020 broke records. The major reasons for hefty penalties included poor customer screening and inefficient AML compliance procedures. Furthermore, damaged brand reputation is another setback for companies. In order to protect your organisation from criminal activities and heavy penalties, it is better to employ KYC/AML verification.

Shufti Pro is a one-stop solution for all your needs. With AI-powered identity verification and AML screening, you can verify all the customers during the onboarding process. Moreover, the ongoing AML screening allows you to screen the backgrounds of high-risk customers as per your requirements. With 98.67% accuracy of our solutions, you can get in touch with the right customers.

Talk to our experts and add robust identity verification protocols to protect your company.

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Need for Identity Verification in Real Estate and Its Real-World Use Cases