What Is a Sanction Check?

Navigating the complexities of international sanctions is critical for businesses operating in regulated industries. Owlin helps you stay ahead with real-time sanctions screening and monitoring, ensuring compliance with the latest global regulations while protecting your organization from risk.

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What are sanctions?

Sanctions are restrictions governments and international bodies impose to regulate trade, prevent financial crimes, and mitigate national security threats. These measures target individuals, companies, and even entire countries suspected of illicit activities such as money laundering, terrorism financing, and human rights violations. Organizations operating in regulated industries must screen and monitor their third parties against multiple global sanction lists to ensure compliance and avoid legal repercussions. Commonly referenced lists include:

  • United Nations Security Council Consolidated List
  • OFAC SDN & Consolidated Lists (USA)
  • European Union Sanctions List
  • HM Treasury Sanctions (UK)
  • Australian DFAT Consolidated List

Failing to comply with these sanctions can lead to severe penalties, reputational damage, and legal consequences.

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What is sanctions screening?

When companies screen an entity, they check if the company is named in official sanctions lists to identify potential compliance risks. This process helps organizations avoid engaging with sanctioned entities, reducing legal exposure and financial risk (fines).

Effective sanctions screening requires automated tools that provide real-time updates, minimize false positives, and streamline compliance workflows.

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What are common challenges for checking sanctions?

Ensuring compliance with ever-evolving sanctions regulations can be a complex and time-consuming process. Some of the common challenges businesses face include:

  • Frequent Updates – sanctions lists change constantly, requiring continuous monitoring.
  • Data Complexity – Screening across multiple jurisdictions requires structured and reliable data sources.
  • Regulatory Pressure – Global authorities demand audit-proof documentation and compliance transparency.
  • Organizations need a powerful, automated solution that ensures accuracy, efficiency, and compliance to meet these challenges.
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Discover Real-Time Sanctions Intelligence:

 

Sanctions: High Stakes. Zero Room for Error.

Part of the Owlin Risk Data Pipeline

Sanctions issued by bodies like OFAC, DFAT, UN, EU, and others are key tools in the global fight against financial crime and security threats.

For businesses in regulated industries, one missed name can mean multi-million-dollar fines, criminal liability, frozen transactions, and lasting reputational damage.

With sanctions constantly evolving, staying compliant takes more than one-time checks. Owlin keeps you compliant with continuous monitoring, not just at onboarding a relationship, but throughout the lifetime of every business relationship.

That’s why Owlin delivers real-time sanctions screening and monitoring across all major global lists, with zero delay and full auditability.

By limiting false positives, Owlin’s advanced AI matching helps you to identify real risks without drowning in alerts.

Our platform is built for global compliance, offering structured data, multi-list screening, and audit-ready documentation at your fingertips.And sanctions are just one layer. Owlin combines sanctions data with adverse media, PEPs, watchlists, and SOE insights for a complete view of a company in one overview.In high-stakes compliance, Owlin helps you stay sharp, stay fast, and stay compliant.

 

Supporting over 1,000 companies worldwide with compliance

Owlin helps businesses screen and monitor politically exposed persons.

Discover Owlin’s solutions for screening and monitoring external risk

Screen and monitor third parties for adverse media
instantly and effortlessly

Owlin’s adverse media tools for adverse media screening and monitoring leverage AI (NLP) and LLMs (Large Language Models) to help you sort through significant amounts of information and quickly make sense of it. This allows you and your organization to focus on the most critical events and avoid wasting time on things that won’t impact your organization.

Sanctions screening

Effortlessly screen third parties for sanctions in a single click:

  • AI-driven risk detection
  • Insights from global sanctions lists
  • Historical sanctions data
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Sanctions monitoring

Round-the-clock sanctions monitoring that keeps you ahead of risk:

  • Actionable, real-time alerts
  • Automated tracking to reduce manual effort
  • Easy team collaboration for faster decision-making
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See Owlin’s sanctions screening and monitoring solutions work

Learn how our AI-driven sanctions screening and monitoring tools can help you identify potential risks and comply with global regulations. Book a demo today to see how we can help mitigate your sanctions-related risks.

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