The Future of Anti-Money Laundering Compliance: Trends and Predictions (The Future of Financial Crime Compliance)

The year 2023 witnessed the introduction of comprehensive reforms by Governments around the world. In the United Kingdom, the criminal offence of ‘failure to prevent fraud’, was created by the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023 which aims to hold a large organisation criminally liable if it benefits from a fraud that is committed by a member of staff. Other parts of Europe also witnessed the introduction of significant reforms with the adoption of the first-ever comprehensive legal framework on Artificial Intelligence (AI) worldwide by the European Parliament and the Council on the Artificial Intelligence. The EU's AI Act seeks to curb the financial crime risks associated with Deepfake technology by making it mandatory for Users of an AI system that generates or manipulates image, audio or video content that appreciably resembles existing persons, objects, places or other entities or events and would falsely appear to a person to be authentic or truthful (‘deep fake’), to disclose that the content has been artificially generated or manipulated. In Africa, Nigeria launched its Open Central Register of Beneficial Ownership (known as the Persons with Significant Control (PSC) Register) in line with its commitment at the Anti-Corruption Summit held in London on 12th May 2016. The year 2024 and 2025 will likely witness the introduction of more impactful reforms. This book will therefore provide an in-depth review and analysis of the topics that are likely to trend on the anti-money laundering space in 2024 and beyond. This research predicts that countries around the world will introduce new requirements for all companies to supply a registered email address and office address, and greater powers for Company Regulators to query information. The Book also predicts that countries around the world will enact laws mandating Providers and Users of Generative AI systems to implement transparency measures to prevent the unlawful use of the AI system for impersonation fraud and money laundering. This book concludes that strategic partnerships across regulators, supervisors, law enforcement, and industry can help to disrupt the illicit use of virtual currency and illicit cyber activity. Regulators and Supervisors can work alongside law enforcement to investigate criminal networks exploiting virtual currency for the purchase of fentanyl, narcotics, cybercrime tools, and child pornography on darknet marketplaces.