Catching financial criminals in Angola could become easier thanks to the country’s central bank adopting screening technology.

The Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications (SWIFT) says in a statement that Angola’s central bank (Banco Nacional de Angola or BNA) is implementing SWIFT’s ‘Sanctions Screening’ service to curb financial crime.

SWIFT says its screening technology is a cloud-based subscription service that filters messages in real time and checks against customers’ selected sanctions lists.

SWIFT says the screening engine then checks for possible matches from sanctions lists’ information using logical tests to detect anagrams, inversion of letters, missing letters, misspellings, abbreviations and phonetic similarities.

The statement notes that five banks in addition to the BNA are expected to implement the screening tech in Angola. Meanwhile, over 150 banks worldwide are said to use SWIFT’s screening solution.

“Banco Nacional de Angola is the fourth central bank in the Africa South region to subscribe to SWIFT’s Sanctions Screening service, which makes it clear that the service is suitable for commercial and central banks alike,” says, Hugo Smit, head of Africa South, SWIFT.

Dr. Ricardo D`Abreu, vice governor, Banco Nacional de Angola, noted: “Financial crime is on the rise globally, and is now one of the biggest challenges facing the world’s financial industry. Banco Nacional de Angola wants to ensure that Angola’s financial community adheres to the highest principles and complies with all international regulations.”