AML PLATFORM EVOLUTION (Project RED ES)

Firms in the financial sector must comply with a series of regulations for the prevention of money laundering and terrorist financing (AML/FT). To do this, they have had to design and implement complex processes to comply with the specific regulations of each jurisdiction in which they operate. Today, the popularity of new financial technologies, such as remote banking, the use of cryptocurrencies, e-commerce platforms, etc., make regulatory compliance even more complex. Although there are software tools to detect suspicious transactions, these are usually based on the knowledge of subject matter experts, but as new criminal tactics emerge, software detection mechanisms become outdated and need to be updated. The use of new technologies based on Machine Learning come to alleviate this problem, since this type of algorithms are capable of learning from the data, without the need for the programmer to re-code expert knowledge. They also provide anomaly detection capabilities that vastly exceed those of humans.

Grupo AIA is the creator of the AML SIOPEIA GEB platform, which uses Artificial Intelligence techniques to analyze a large volume of data and offers a solution to the AML/FT problem to important financial entities in Spain and Portugal. This proposal to RED.ES is aimed at applying state-of-the-art Machine Learning techniques to improve the quality of the suspicions generated by the analysis processes, both to reduce false positives and to increase the types of risk cases detected (that is, reduce also false negatives). Along the same lines, it proposes applying network/graph analysis to establish new detection criteria based on characteristics of the customer relationship graph and their operations. In addition, in the field of robotics, it is proposed to automate the manual processes of the supervision team, by applying face recognition. And finally, to also reduce the workload of analysts, it proposes applying machine learning to triage suspicions, so that their review reduces the risks of the entity.

The public entity RED.ES, attached to Spain’s Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation, through the Secretary of State for Digitization and Artificial Intelligence, through the 2021 Call for aid for R&D projects in artificial intelligence and other digital technologies and their integration into value chains, has granted financial support to the company APLICACIONES EN INFORMÁTICA AVANZADA, S.L. as a beneficiary of the grant for the development of the project “ADVANCED DETECTION OF MONEY LAUNDERING WITH MACHINE LEARNING”.

APLICACIONES EN INFORMÁTICA AVANZADA, SOCIEDAD LIMITADA.

Documentation for the merger by absorption between Aplicaciones en Informática Avanzada, S.L. and Holding Elequant, S.L.

APLICACIONES EN INFORMÁTICA AVANZADA, SOCIEDAD LIMITADA. EXTRAORDINARY GENERAL SHAREHOLDER’S MEETING

Mrs. Regina María Llopis Rivas, as the Sole Administrator of the company APLICACIONES EN INFORMÁTICA AVANZADA, S.L., calls the Extraordinary General Shareholders’ Meeting, to be held in Sant Cugat del Vallés (Barcelona) at Avenida de la Torre Blanca, number 57, Edificio ESADECREAPOLIS, on January 25th, 2023 at 11:00am.

 

THE CALL AND AGENDA FOR THE ORDINARY AND EXTRAORDINARY GENERAL SHAREHOLDER’S MEETING OF INFORMÁTICA AVANZADA S.L.

¡Los iguales para hoy!

Note: ONCE, the Spanish National Organization of the Blind, is a not-for-profit organization established in 1938. It is the only organization of blind and visually impaired persons in the whole country. Its aim is to provide to its members with the widest range of services possible, from education to employment, from rehabilitation to reading services. ONCE is a self-funded organization, with the selling of tickets for its own lottery as its main means of funding.

For Spanish readers, the title of this article will remind them of a bygone era in which ONCE sellers, walking the streets with their lottery tickets hanging from their chests or from their newly installed booths, called us to participate in what would later be called “la ilusión de todos los días” [every day’s dream].

What few people know is that this activity entailed solving an interesting and complex mathematical problem derived from ONCE’s concern for facilitating the job of its sellers, many of whom are blind.

The organization allowed each seller to choose the variety (number of attached columns of different numbers) and height (number of equal numbers in said columns) of those panels on which they hanged their lottery tickets for display, which they called “topes”. In this way, the offer could be adjusted to the usual clientele of each seller, who would sometimes be inclined to buy several identical numbers to share among friends, and some other times would buy different numbers to have more chances of winning the draw. Each seller chose how many tops of different sizes they wanted to have for sale.

The numbering of the adjacent columns in each top was tricky, since it had to give the impression of being very varied, having both high and low digits, rich in different digits and endings, and they had to be different every day. To facilitate the job of the sellers and prevent them from having to learn the list of all the numbers for sale every day, the organization thought of a series of rules that would make it possible to deduce, from the ticket number in the first column of each top, those of the tickets in the following columns, simply by adding certain amounts to the number of the previous column.

In addition, the printing of the coupons was also intended to prevent a seller from receiving too many tickets having what they considered as “less sellable” numbers such as, according to their own jargon, ugly numbers (because they have too many repeated digits) or the “pelaos” (those ending in several zeros), to mention just two examples.

As a consequence of all of the above, the printing of lottery tickets entailed configuring the arrangement of a series of rectangles of different sizes (the topes) inside a rectangle with a larger area (the plate of the ticket-printing machine). Thus, the different printed sheets would contain the numbered topes according to the established rules, ready to be cut, selected, and distributed.

The mathematical problem of locating rectangles is as simple to formulate as it is complex to solve. At ONCE, a blind person was in charge of figuring out how to best fit the different-sized topes requested by the sellers inside the rectangles of the printing plates. Armed with a voice recorder to record the positions as he was thinking about it, he gradually adjusted the settings of the topes to optimize the settings for the printing of the tickets, so that paper was not wasted and the cutting process was simplified for distribution among the sellers.

This was an arduous task, taking weeks to complete. Therefore, sellers were allowed to request to change their ticket portfolio only a few times a year, typically once a quarter.

To improve this situation, ONCE asked AIA to create an algorithm for optimizing the printing of tickets that would make it possible to have different topes each week and even each day. It is curious to note that the problem of placing several rectangles within a larger one is one of the first use cases of quantum computers currently under development. Following the same algorithmic ideas, about 20 years ago, AIA created this algorithm and included it in a complete solution that contemplated vendor requests, planned optimal printing, and assigned printed and cut topes to vendors.

Thanks to this solution, the frequency with which sellers could change their ticket portfolio increased, allowing variations to be set for key dates or periods, such as holidays or vacation periods in which the clientele of the seller can vary substantially. Today, two decades later, this solution created by AIA continues to be used every day by ONCE, being one of our most beloved and present success stories.

This December 13, 2022, on the day of its patron Saint Lucia, ONCE turns 84. From AIA we want to congratulate the organization on this day and thank you for allowing us to put our slogan “algorithms for a better world” into practice, with our humble contribution to the work of the organization.

This is the first in a series of posts in which AIA looks back on some of its past experiences in celebrating its 35th anniversary over the course of a year.

APLICACIONES EN INFORMÁTICA AVANZADA, SOCIEDAD LIMITADA

APLICACIONES EN INFORMÁTICA AVANZADA, SOCIEDAD LIMITADA. ORDINARY AND EXTRAORDINARY GENERAL SHAREHOLDER’S MEETING

Mrs. Regina María Llopis Rivas, as the Sole Administrator of the company APLICACIONES EN INFORMÁTICA AVANZADA, S.L., calls the Ordinary and Extraordinary General Shareholder´s Meeting, to be held in Sant Cugat del Vallés (Barcelona) at Avenida de la Torre Blanca, number 57, Edificio ESADECREAPOLIS, on June 29th, 2022 at 11:00am.

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