More Uses for GenAI in FinCrime Investigations

 

Building on my previous post: 3 Ways Generative AI Can Help with Financial Crimes Investigations we'll explore three more ways GenAI can be useful in FinCrime Investigations:

This technology is here to stay and it should be made good use of!

1. Enhanced transaction monitoring: By using Generative AI more sophisticated, beneficial and adaptive transaction monitoring systems can be created. These systems can learn from past incidents and continuously update their criteria to detect new and evolving financial crime patterns in real-time. While this technology is currently in use, GenAI can be leveraged to make it even more efficient.

2. Synthetic data generation: AI can generate synthetic financial datasets that mimic real-world scenarios. How cool is that? This allows investigators and analysts to train on diverse, complex scenarios without compromising sensitive customer data. Investigators and analysts will be more protected from being able to damage evidence, inadvertently or on purpose.

3. Automated report generation: Reports are always fun, no? AI can compile and summarize investigation findings into coherent, standardized reports. This saves time for investigators and ensures consistency in documentation across cases. Always remember: AI is there to give you the answers you want, not necessarily the truth. GenAI is an excellent summarization and re-wording tool.

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3 Biggest Problems Faced When Considering Evidence

   

I have been working financial crimes and cyber investigations for over 20 years.

Since starting as a computer geek and working my way up to financial crimes investigations, I have learned a lot about what it takes to solve some of the biggest problems people face in our industry. In fact, they are a lot easier to solve than most people think. You just need to change how you're thinking about them.

Here they are (in a nutshell), and how to solve them:

#1: Not following applicable laws: How to solve it: Investigators must thoroughly familiarize themselves with applicable laws, particularly the Rules of Evidence. These crucial regulations, typically adopted by statute, are codified into formal legal documents that guide investigative procedures and admissibility of evidence.

#2: Not authenticating your evidence: How to solve it: Authenticating evidence typically requires witness testimony. For digital evidence, this may involve a witness with personal knowledge of the item in question. For example, someone who shared a computer with the accused and directly observed the relevant document or file on that device could serve as an authenticating witness.

#3: Not defining your evidence: How to solve it: Learn how to define the different types of evidence. Evidence in investigations can be both digital and physical, and it's often the combination and correlation of different types of evidence that builds a strong case.

See? That wasn't so hard.

Obviously, these are very surface samples of what problems can be faced when considering evidence. Keep tuned for future posts that will help elaborate on these critical issues regarding evidence.

I'd love to hear your viewpoints!

#fincrime #investigations #financialcrime #banks #cybersecurity #evidence #court #witnesses #documentation #authentication #laws #jurisdictions

3 Ways to Tank Your Growing Business - And How to Avoid It

Mistake #1: No Policies & Procedures - Why this can lead to misconduct

Someone just microwaved fish in the lunch room. Lucy in the mail room is using her personal email address for business. Jack just installed some software on his station to work from home. It's absolutely amazing how many businesses I have come across that are in the process of growing and expanding, yet have never considered policies and procedures to be important. Policies are good practice guidelines that you and your employees should follow on a daily basis. There should also be a formal process in place for employees to sign and agree to the terms of the policies. Procedures are things that you do on a daily basis, but are documented so they can be replicated if needed by a new employee. Policies and procedures set clear expectations for employee behavior and job performance. They provide guidance on how to handle various situations, which can improve decision-making and reduce confusion or conflicts in the workplace.

Mistake #2: No Disaster Recovery or Incident Response - Why this can lead to legal risks

Hackers are knocking at your door. Your network is under siege. You never saw this coming. That is the failure of not having a good incident response plan in place. Without being able to detect incidents before they happen you'll be unable to protect your network and your data sufficiently. During an incident, stress levels are high and time is critical. A pre-established plan provides a clear framework for decision-making, ensuring that team members know their roles and can act decisively rather than panicking or making poor choices in the heat of the moment. Without this you face increased liability in case of data breaches or other security incidents. This puts you in a weakened legal position if faced with lawsuits from affected parties (e.g., customers whose data was compromised).

Your data's being held up by ransomware. Somewhere in your organization, someone invited malware in and it's running rampant through your network. You're facing a flood, an electrical nightmare or maybe a typhoon or apocalypse. You have to shut everything down. Only you have no plan to recover from this disaster. Disaster recovery plans can cover everything from basic recovery to more complex recovery based on your environment. Loss of critical data and systems, make it especially difficult or impossible to rebuild operations. You may even have difficulty obtaining insurance payouts without proper documentation of pre-disaster assets and processes. Completely avoidable.

Mistake #3: No Business Continuity - Why this can lead to unrecoverable damage

You couldn't recover from the disaster. Your customers are losing trust in you. The media is raining on your parade. All because you didn't create a business continuity plan to recover from a disaster and carry on. If you manage to scrabble your way out of the rubble, you may find that regaining customer trust is almost impossible. A business continuity plan prepares an organization to maintain essential functions during and after a crisis or disaster. This could include natural disasters, cyberattacks, pandemics, or other unexpected events. By identifying critical processes and resources in advance, the organization can respond more effectively to disruptions, minimizing downtime and financial losses.

What is a growing company to do so they are protected against external and internal threats?

Invest in a solid governance, compliance and risk program. Simply starting with policies and procedures will go a long way to protecting your organization against legal, regulatory, compliance and financial risks.

My GRC expertise is ready to assist in determining your current security stance and help you on your path to affordable, better compliance. Contact me today to request a consultation.

#governance #risk #compliance #policies #procedures #disasterrecovery #incidentresponse #cybersecurity #businesscontinuity #business #disaster #grc