Federal banking regulators issued a statement clarifying how community banks can communicate with customers about potentially fraudulent transactions without breaching Suspicious Activity Report confidentiality requirements.
Details: The regulators said:
- The Bank Secrecy Act and its regulations prohibit banks from disclosing a SAR or any information that would reveal that a SAR exists.
- However, under FinCEN’s implementing regulation for SAR confidentiality, “a SAR or any information that would reveal the existence of a SAR” does not include “the underlying facts, transactions, and documents upon which a SAR is based.”
- The BSA does not prohibit banks from communicating with a customer who may be the subject of a SAR about potentially fraudulent or other suspicious transactions involving the customer’s account or notifying the customer of the bank’s intention to close the account for potentially fraudulent or other suspicious activity, so long as that communication does not reveal the existence of a SAR.
- The statement does not alter existing legal or regulatory requirements or establish new supervisory expectations.
More: A recent Independent Banker article details ICBA’s fight for BSA reforms.