Alicia Nicholls
In an ever more interconnected world, financial criminals are finding endlessly ingenuous and sophisticated methods of perpetuating crimes and laundering the proceeds of their criminal activity. Artificial intelligence (AI), which broadly refers to the simulation of human intelligence by machines, can be both an enabler of, but also an invaluable tool for fighting financial crime. It is, therefore, imperative for businesses to both understand the risks emanating from AI, but also the ways in which this transformative technology could help them protect themselves and their customers from financial fraudsters. I gleaned these insights from a fireside chat with finance expert, Eduardo Sanchez, Special Vice President and Head of Cyber & Intelligence (Latin America and the Caribbean) at Mastercard which I moderated during the recently held 2nd Fintech Islands Conference in Barbados on January 24-26, 2024.
AI is already integrated in our daily lives
To an increasing extent, AI is integrated into our daily routines to help improve our productivity and make our very busy lives much easier. Many of us professionals now use virtual assistants like Amazon’s Alexa, Apple’s Siri and Google Assistant to do mundane tasks, freeing up our time to do other things. Businesses are using AI-powered chatbots and virtual assistants to provide customer assistance in a more efficient manner, and increasingly using AI-powered algorithms to analyse vast amounts of data to observe customer behaviour and predict market trends to assist in their business planning, research and innovation. On a wider scale, AI is having a non-negligible impact in fields such as ecommerce logistics, banking and finance, telemedicine, and preventive healthcare, to name a few. In a Blog post dated January 14, 2024, IMF Chief Kristalina Georgieva called for a ‘careful balance of policies’ to ensure a positive net effect of AI on the global economy, noting that 40% of the global job market could be ‘exposed’ to the effects of AI. Indeed, there are also real ethical, privacy and other considerations emanating from the misuse of this technology by bad actors. These must be addressed if AI is to have a truly transformative impact.
AI and financial crime
AI can be used to imitate human sounds and images for the purpose of scamming and bribery. In March 2023, the United States (US) Federal Trade Commission (FTC) published a consumer alert warning of the use of AI tools to clone loved ones’ voices in order to scam money from their relatives, but also the use of AI-powered chatbots to perpetuate romance scams. Moreover, the release of fake AI-generated sexually explicit nude images of pop singer Taylor Swift on X (formerly known as Twitter) has generated condemnation from the White House and also prompted a bipartisan effort in the US congress to tackle this issue.
Since machine learning algorithms can be trained to simulate human behavior, they can enable fraudsters to send out highly personalized and realistic phishing emails to unwitting persons. Take for example the spam emails we often receive purporting to be from financial institutions asking us to ‘verify’ our account data. Fraudsters can harness AI’s powerful analytical abilities to find multiple username and password combinations to hack into websites and accounts and also more quickly and efficiently analyse the sensitive customer data emanating from breaches in order to steal their identities and perpetuate scams. Moreover, AI algorithms could be used by money launderers to evade traditional systems of detecting suspicious transactions.
AI as a solution
While the above is quite scary, the good news is that AI is increasingly a powerful tool to fight financial crime. Regtech is becoming an important asset for financial institutions to help them assess risks, streamline and automate reporting and documentation procedures, thereby lowering their compliance costs.
Mr. Sanchez pointed to the way that AI-driven algorithms are used by businesses like Mastercard, the world’s second largest payments platform. AI is used increasingly by businesses in fraud prevention to monitor historical patterns in a customer’s transaction behaviour and therefore raise a red flag if there is a deviation from this, triggering an alert for further investigation to determine whether fraudulent activity is indeed occurring.
Another key take-way from my chat with Mr. Sanchez was that businesses need to consider both the risks but also the benefits AI could play in their cybersecurity efforts. Doing so not only ensures they are a step ahead of criminals, but also protects their reputations and their customers. This is important as many of us could name at least one prominent business or entity we know which has suffered a major data breach and the angst we customers felt at the potential of our sensitive data being used by the perpetrators for nefarious purposes. In an April 2023 blog piece, Barbadian-born internationally renowned cybersecurity expert Niel Harper called for the “responsible and ethical use of AI” and offered practical advice to businesses which are incorporating AI into their activities on how they could do so responsibly and ethically.
Fintech Islands as a space for Fintech thought leadership
Since its first iteration in 2022, the Fintech Islands Conference is fast becoming one of the ‘must-attend’ conferences in the Caribbean region for persons with an interest in fintech, allowing for a rich exchange of insights and ideas among industry gurus, regulators and policy makers from across the Caribbean and the world. I was grateful for the opportunity afforded to academics and trade policy specialists like myself who have an interest in regulatory issues to participate in these three days of interesting panels on a diversity of topics. My session on Day 1 with Mr. Sanchez of Mastercard was one of several in the AI track, but there were tracks on banking revolution, climate fintech, digital assets and web 3.0, payments innovation, modernising central banking, open finance, future of commerce and wealth building.
This second successful staging of the Fintech Islands Conference is an important step in solidifying Barbados’ reputation as a space for world-class thought leadership and discussion of cutting-edge trends in this rapidly developing field. And why not enjoy some famous Barbadian rum, beaches, sunshine and hospitality while you are at it? I wish to extend heartfelt kudos to the conference’s visionary organisers for another informative, interesting and engaging conference and I look forward to the next edition!
Photo credit: Matt Hamilton. Eduardo Sanchez (left), Alicia Nicholls (right)
Alicia D. Nicholls is an international trade specialist and founder of the Caribbean Trade Law & Development Blog. She has a keen interest in foreign investment law and policy and global financial regulatory issues. Read more of her work at http://www.caribbeantradelaw.com.