Sanctions screening
Global regulatory fines reached a record $19.3 billion in 2024. Under strict liability, you pay even if you did not know. ScreenVeritAI screens across 10+ sanctions regimes in one workflow — with fuzzy matching that catches transliterations, aliases, and intermediary schemes that exact search misses.
These are not hypothetical scenarios. Every case below resulted in real penalties, real investigations, or real prison time.
$216M
Invested on behalf of a sanctioned Russian individual. Failed to screen ultimate beneficiaries through multiple corporate layers.
What went wrong
No beneficial ownership screening. The sanctioned person was hidden behind intermediary entities that passed name-only checks.
$9.6M
Iran sanctions violations routed through subsidiaries in Dubai and Switzerland. Parent company held liable for subsidiary conduct.
What went wrong
Subsidiaries operated outside the parent company's sanctions screening program. Intermediary jurisdictions masked the ultimate destination.
GBP 1.16M
Record UK compound settlement for making goods available to Russia in breach of sanctions regulations.
What went wrong
Assumed UK enforcement was theoretical. HMRC now actively investigates and penalizes sanctions breaches — with record penalties.
5 years prison
Criminal prosecution for luxury car exports to Russia via intermediaries. Assets confiscated. Individual sentenced to prison.
What went wrong
Relied on the intermediary's assurances about end destination. No independent screening of the supply chain.
$300K
Television shipments to a Panama company with hidden Cuban government ties. The company did not know — and paid the full penalty.
What went wrong
No screening of the buyer's ownership structure. The Cuban government connection was not visible in the company name or registration.
$50K
Chartered a single boat whose owner had ties to the Cuban government. One transaction, one fine.
What went wrong
A single unscreened transaction. The vessel owner's government ties were publicly available but never checked.
Screen across OFAC, EU, UN, UK, Australia, Canada, Switzerland, South Africa, New Zealand, and Poland simultaneously. One search, full jurisdictional coverage.
Transliteration, alias resolution, and phonetic matching catch the spelling variations, name inversions, and intermediary schemes that real enforcement cases exploited.
Every screening generates timestamped evidence with match details, source references, and decision rationale — built for OFAC's 10-year record retention requirement.
When new SDN entries are added or existing designations change, your next screening reflects it. No stale data, no gaps between list publication and your screening.
Five steps between you and an auditable sanctions decision.
Provide the entity name, known aliases, and country. The more identifiers you include, the more precise the matching.
ScreenVeritAI queries 10+ sanctions regimes in parallel, applying fuzzy matching, transliteration, and alias resolution to each.
Each potential match shows the originating list, designation program, match confidence, and the specific fields that triggered the hit.
Generate a timestamped report with screening results, source references, and your documented rationale — ready for compliance files or regulatory review.
Configure alerts for new designations affecting screened entities. When lists change, you are notified before your next transaction.
U.S. Department of the Treasury
U.S. Department of the Treasury
European External Action Service
United Nations Security Council
HM Treasury, UK Government
United States Code
Go beyond sanctions lists — map ownership, PEP exposure, and adverse media.
Screen hundreds of entities across all sanctions regimes in one upload.
See every sanctions list and jurisdiction ScreenVeritAI covers.
Set up continuous monitoring for new designations and list changes.
Sanctions screening is the process of checking individuals, companies, and transactions against government-maintained lists of sanctioned entities. It is legally required because most jurisdictions impose strict liability for sanctions violations — meaning your organization can be penalized even if the violation was unintentional. In the US, OFAC can impose civil penalties of up to $377,700 per violation, and willful violations under IEEPA carry criminal penalties of up to $1 million and 20 years imprisonment.
Consequences range from substantial fines to criminal prosecution. OFAC's maximum civil penalty is $377,700 per violation, and willful violations carry up to $1 million and 20 years in prison under IEEPA. In practice, penalties often run into millions: GVA Capital faced $216 million for investing on behalf of a sanctioned Russian individual, and 3M paid $9.6 million for Iran-related violations routed through subsidiaries. Beyond financial penalties, academic research shows stock price losses averaging 9 times the financial penalty imposed (Armour, Mayer & Polo, JFQA), and non-compliance costs 2.71 times more than maintaining a compliance program (Ponemon Institute).
ScreenVeritAI screens across 10+ major global sanctions regimes simultaneously: US OFAC (SDN and Consolidated Lists), EU Consolidated Financial Sanctions List, UN Security Council Sanctions, UK HM Treasury (OFSI), Australia DFAT Consolidated Sanctions List, Canada OSFI Consolidated, Switzerland SECO Sanctions, South Africa FIC Targeted Financial Sanctions, New Zealand Police Designated Terrorists, and Poland MSWiA National List — plus national, sectoral, and adverse media sources.
Yes, but only with the right approach. Many enforcement cases — including the 3M case ($9.6M for Iran violations routed through Dubai and Swiss subsidiaries) and the German exporter case (5 years prison for car exports to Russia via intermediaries) — involved sanctioned parties hidden behind layers of intermediaries. ScreenVeritAI's fuzzy matching and alias resolution catch the spelling variations, transliterations, and name structures that intermediary schemes typically exploit.
Yes. Sanctions obligations apply to virtually all businesses, not just banks. A Milwaukee electronics company paid $300,000 for unknowingly shipping televisions to a company with hidden Cuban government ties. A California charter company paid $50,000 for a single boat charter. OFAC's jurisdiction extends to any US person or entity, and secondary sanctions can reach non-US companies engaging with sanctioned parties.
OFAC now requires 10 years of record retention — doubled from the previous 5-year requirement. This means every screening decision, match result, and rationale document must be preserved and retrievable for a full decade. ScreenVeritAI generates timestamped evidence bundles with source references and documented rationale designed to meet this requirement.
Sanctions screening checks whether an entity appears on a prohibited list — it is one component of a broader compliance program. Customer due diligence (CDD) encompasses the full risk assessment: beneficial ownership mapping, PEP exposure analysis, adverse media screening, and risk-tier classification. Sanctions screening answers whether the entity is prohibited; CDD answers whether the entity is risky. Most compliance frameworks require both.
Exact name matching misses transliterations (e.g., Cyrillic-to-Latin), alias variations, name inversions, and spelling differences across languages. Fuzzy matching applies phonetic algorithms, transliteration tables, and alias resolution to catch these variations. This is critical because sanctions evasion frequently exploits exactly these gaps — slight name changes that defeat exact search while remaining identifiable to sophisticated matching algorithms.
Most screenings complete in under two minutes. You enter the entity name, aliases, and country; ScreenVeritAI simultaneously queries 10+ sanctions regimes with fuzzy matching; and results are returned with explainable match context, confidence scores, and source references. The entire workflow from name entry to exportable evidence bundle takes minutes, not hours.
Every screening generates a timestamped evidence bundle containing: the entity details submitted, all sanctions regimes queried, each potential match with list source and confidence score, the specific fields that triggered each match, and your documented rationale for the decision. This output is designed to satisfy OFAC's 10-year record retention requirement and regulatory expectations for auditable compliance documentation.