Sybase Inc. has bundled its integration software with TightLink Corp.s business-to-business collaboration software to create a package designed to enable financial institutions to comply with new reporting regulations.
The Sybase Patriotcompliance Solution, available now, combines Sybases NEON, or New Era of Networks, business process integration technology and its Enterprise Portal with the anti-money laundering and Bank Secrecy Act compliance technology in TightLinks CIS (Compliance and Investigation System) 3. With it, organizations will be able to comply with the USA Patriot Act of 2001, which goes into effect in October and requires financial institutions to identify and report to the federal government any suspect activity from customers, officials said.
Sybase, of Dublin, Calif., estimates more than 6,000 financial institutions face the October deadline.
The Patriotcompliance software is intended for use by a number of departments within banks, brokerages and other financial institutions to resolve exceptions triggered by suspicious activity, officials said. Using the combined software, financial institutions will have the capability to establish detection filters, monitor in real time complex financial transactions, automatically file Suspicious Activity Reports, follow ongoing investigations and disperse automatic notifications when cases need to be escalated, Sybase officials said.
At the same time, compliance officers, account managers, fraud departments and funds transfer professionals will have the ability to work together in a Web-based, collaborative environment, created by TightLink, of Berkeley, Calif., to track fraudulent activity.
The Patriotcompliance software triggers exceptions by monitoring and examining individual financial transactions or sets of transactions for pre-defined suspect activity. Suspect activity includes a number of parameters such as changes in the amounts of money moved or transactions with people or countries targeted on watch lists such as the Office of Foreign Asset Controls Specially Designated Nationals list.
Once an exception is flagged, a case is automatically created in the TightLink CIS application, where the appropriate financial officials can access it.
The Sybase-TightLink solution differentiates itself from other compliance software with its integration technology, said Breffni McGuire, an analyst at TowerGroup, in Needham, Mass. In this way, the Patriotcompliance software also allows companies to leverage existing technology.
“The integration technology is certainly helpful, and its a differentiator for them,” said McGuire. “The other thing thats of interest with Sybase … is its a known entity.”