Sanctions Screening is the process of checking customers, counterparties, and transactions against government sanctions lists (OFAC SDN, EU consolidated list, UN sanctions, UK OFSI list).
Sanctions Screening is the operational control that translates sanctions law into business action. Sanctions regimes prohibit dealing with specified persons, entities, vessels, aircraft, and territories, and they impose strict liability: unlike AML, sanctions breaches do not generally require intent or knowledge, only the prohibited transaction.
Major lists include the US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List (SDN), the OFAC Sectoral Sanctions Identifications List (SSI), the EU Consolidated List of Persons, Groups and Entities Subject to EU Financial Sanctions, the UN Security Council Consolidated Sanctions List, the UK Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation (OFSI) Consolidated List, and country-specific regimes (Russia, Iran, North Korea, Syria, Belarus, Cuba) which expand quickly during geopolitical events.
Screening covers customer onboarding, ongoing customer monitoring (delta screening as lists update), transaction screening (especially cross-border wires using SWIFT MT103/MT202 messages), and trade-related screening (dual-use goods, restricted end-users, sanctioned vessels via IMO numbers). False positives are managed through risk-based whitelisting and adverse-media validation.
You will encounter sanctions screening at customer onboarding (KYC), at every cross-border payment, at every supplier or counterparty addition, and at transaction-monitoring rules that catch sectoral-sanctions or 50-percent-rule exposure. Banks block or freeze transactions and typically file a Blocked Transactions Report or equivalent regulatory return.
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