Intel Launches Intel Saffron AML Advisor Using AI to Detect Financial Crime
Bank of New Zealand Joins Intel Saffron Early Adopter Program to Accelerate Adoption of Innovative AI Technologies in
the World of Banking
NEWS HIGHLIGHTS
• Intel Saffron Anti-Money Laundering (AML) Advisor uses explainable AI to enhance decision-making for
investigators and analysts. Associative memory AI finds and explains multidimensional patterns so that investigators and
analysts can explore emerging trends across a bank’s or insurer’s data.
• With an unsupervised learning approach, the AML Advisor unifies structured and unstructured data from enterprise
systems, email, web and other data sources to deliver insights along with the explanation of how connections were
identified.
• Additionally, the AML Advisor provides the transparency required to comply with ever-tighter regulatory
standards.
• Intel Saffron Early Adopter Program partners with five select organisations to utilise the latest developments
in associative memory AI to shape the future of financial services.
Auckland via California, 12 October 2017 – Intel today launched the Intel® Saffron™ Anti-Money Laundering (AML) Advisor,
aimed at detecting financial crime through a transparent AI solution utilising associative memory. Today’s launch kicks
off the first associative memory AI solution specifically tailored to the needs of financial services institutions and
is optimised on Intel Xeon® Scalable processors.
Intel Saffron’s associative memory AI simulates a human’s natural ability to learn, remember and reason in real time. It
mimics the associative memory of the human brain to surface similarities and anomalies hidden in dynamic, heterogeneous
data sources, while accessing an infinitely larger data set than its human counterparts. The AML Advisor surfaces these
patterns in a transparent way, paving the way for “white box AI” in enterprise applications. These solutions are
designed to enhance decision-making in highly complex tasks, and early results indicate they can catch money launderers
with unprecedented speed and efficiency.
Total financial crime is at all-time highs. According to the UN, the estimated amount of money laundered globally in one
year is 2 to 5 percent of global GDP, or US$800 billion to $2 trillion.1 In addition, in 2016 alone, approximately 15.4
million consumers were victims of identity theft or fraud, resulting in $16 billion in losses.2
“Intel Saffron’s mission is to minimise the time and effort it takes to reach confident decisions,” said Gayle Sheppard,
vice president and general manager of Saffron AI Group at Intel. “We accelerate the path to decision by surfacing and
explaining patterns in data with speed, precision and accuracy. The amount of data that banks and insurers collect is
growing at massive scale, doubling every two years. While the quantity of data is growing, so are the types and sources
of data, which means today much of the data isn’t queried for insights because it’s simply not accessible with
traditional tools at scale. Investigators and analysts will depend on transparent AI solutions to meet the ever-growing
demands of consistency and efficiency from a business, regulatory and compliance perspective.”
Banks and financial organisations often have 50 or more applications that require use of the same personal financial
data. Banks want a more efficient way to manage their data, putting an end to moving and replicating data, which is
costly and increases risk. They also want visibility to the unified knowledge across multiple data sources to better
serve customers. Intel Saffron AML Advisor uses associative memory AI to discover new insights for growing businesses,
meeting compliance and regulatory requirements, and fighting financial crime with a suite of features, including:
•Knowledge Index: Unifying structured and unstructured data linked into a 360-degree view at the individual entity level, to make sense
of the patterns found across boundaries wherever the data is stored. This derives knowledge that is hard to gain with
vendor and database proliferation of point solutions.
•Continuous Learning: Unlike traditional machine learning methods, Intel Saffron AML Advisor doesn’t require domain specific models nor
training and retraining, resulting in improving the time to insight. The financial services industry faces the challenge
of “What will be important tomorrow?” In this dynamic landscape, actionable insights realised in hours or days rather
than weeks or months is an imperative.
•Work Augmentation: Intel Saffron AML Advisor reduces the human cognitive burden through automation thought processes that work with and
for the investigator allowing them to focus on higher value activities.
•Compliance Validation: Banks collect the data necessary to comply with various regulations, but often must pay non-compliance fines in the
billions due to human error or missed deadlines. Intel Saffron AML Advisor explains the rationale behind the
recommendations to help banks meet compliance, mitigate fines and reduce countless hours reworking reports.
Intel also introduced the Intel Saffron Early Adopter Program (EAP). This program is designed for institutions whose
ambition is to lead the pack on innovation
in financial services by taking advantage of the latest advancements in associative memory artificial intelligence. It
allows its members to gain the first-mover advantage over the competition and define the future of associative memory AI
in financial services. Expanding upon its existing relationship with Intel, Bank of New Zealand* (BNZ) has joined the
Intel Saffron EAP.
“We’re excited to be working with Intel Saffron on truly bleeding edge technology that will enable us to understand our
customers far better than we ever have before and help them make smarter decisions” said David Bullock, director of
Products and Technology at BNZ. “By staying at the forefront of AI, we can help ensure we have access to the latest,
innovative technologies that enhance our business.”
Intel Saffron solutions allow BNZ to take advantage of its existing big data platform to glean increasingly
sophisticated insights for innovative customer service.
For more details about the Intel Saffron AML Advisor and the Intel Saffron Early Adopter Program, visit -
[1] United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/money-laundering/globalization.html
[2] Javelin Strategy & Research, 2017 Identity Fraud Study, https://www.javelinstrategy.com/press-release/identity-fraud-hits-record-high-154-million-us-victims-2016-16-percent-according-new
Intel, Saffron, Xeon and the Intel logo are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the United States and other countries.
*Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.
ENDS
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