PRESS RELEASE
April 10, 2003
"objective risk management services"
Dallas, Texas - The USA Patriot Act, signed by President Bush in October, 2001,
requires financial services companies to develop improved capabilities to identify
customers and flag suspicious transactions. Federal regulators will sanction any
organization whose compliance system does not meet the requirements. Most provisions
of the USA Patriot Act become law in 2003, and brokerages are expected to invest
over $400 million this year to comply with the antiterrorism and anti-money-laundering
portions of the regulations.
One particular effort has been the formation of the Regulatory DataCorp International LLC (RDC)
by 20 of the largest brokerages such as Goldman Sachs Group, Citigroup Inc., Merrill Lynch & Co.,
and others. Since the launch of the RDC in July, 2002, over two dozen additional registered
securities dealers, of the approximately 5,500 registered U.S. securities dealers, have become
clients of the RDC. Yet, the number of brokerages that have signed up to comply is still only
a tiny fraction of those needing to comply. The biggest roadblock is cost.
Hence, The Integrity Center, Inc., Dallas, Texas, a national background checking firm, is
providing an alternative for brokerages to help them satisfy the portion of the Act dealing
with background checks. This should be especially valuable to firms that do not want to
invest in back-end system integration, software development, or major IT system
upgrades.
A brokerage only needs to have a high speed Internet connection, and all work is completed
via their browsers using secure encrypted communications. A brokerage can access its work
24/7 from its browsers. At any time, a brokerage can import existing work into their
current computer systems using a common API protocol. The Integrity Center, Inc. provides
the background checking paperwork that also complies with the Federal Trade Commission
privacy requirements. All data are freshly retrieved daily, and therefore, unlike stored
data from gigantic databases, the reports comply with Federal law and do not have
multi-month time gaps since last being updated from their respective sources.
The Integrity Center, Inc., founded in 1984, and
based in Dallas, TX, is a firm recognized nationally for employee background checking,
online employee files, and risk management, for business, industry and government. The
Integrity Center and its website are a rich source of current information regarding the
laws, procedures, and pitfalls in all areas of background checking and personnel records.
FOR ADDITIONAL INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT:
Director of Media Relations
The Integrity Center, Inc.
(972) 484-6140
info@integctr.com
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