Bank Rakyat Indonesia goes with InfrasofTech for AML solution

Handling one million transactions daily, across 4,500 branches, Bank Rakyat Indonesia (BRI) has put into place what is today the world's largest anti-money laundering (AML) deployment project.

Having successfully executed the $ 600,000 contract, India-based Infrasoft Technologies Ltd is now eyeing the Indian market ever since the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has set the deadline of December 2005 for banks to have proper AML systems in place.

The new trend in the world of banking today is that banks are adopting AML solution across the entire bank unlike in the past when AML solutions were put into place in a small footprint, said Hanuman Tripathi, managing director, Infrasoft Technologies.

AML solutions sold to entities like Bank of America, Barclays and a host of other global banks including Bank of India's UK operations, were limited to specific branches and geographies.

"The shift in the trend follows the change in technology, which can integrate multiple solutions in the bank and ensure wider coverage," added Tripathi.

Bank Rakyat Indonesia, formed in 1895, is one of the largest and oldest banks in the Asia Pacific region, having 4,875 branches with approximately 3.9 crore customer accounts.

This bank is the first to deploy AML across all the 950 branches on the centralised core banking architecture. "This has been possible since our architecture allows for scaling up, unlike older technology built five years back," pointed out Tripathi.

Another important reason why banks are implementing the software across all possible branches stems from regulations. Correspondence banks, foreign governments and central banks are putting the pressure on domestic banks to ensure proper survelliance systems are in place, said Tripathi.

Asia-Pacific accounts for 30 per cent of the $856-billion money laundering market today and the figure is expected to rise.