Know Your Customer (KYC)

Know Your Customer (KYC) is a set of procedures for verifying a customer¿s identity when doing business with financial institutions. Compliance with KYC regulations helps to check economic crimes, especially terrorism financing, money laundering, and sundry fraud schemes. When properly implemented, financial institutions are more accurately able to pinpoint suspicious activities by verifying a customer¿s identity and intentions at the time of account opening, and during ongoing monitoring of transactions. Hence, aside from the risks of fines and other penalties from regulatory authorities, non-compliance with KYC standards exposes financial institutions to avoidable litigations and sundry existential threats. Know Your Customer (KYC) is Book 2 of the Governance, Risk Management, and Compliance (GRC) series. Generally, it discusses the essence and framework of KYC and why it is essential in the modern discourse on GRC.