LSEG Risk Intelligence, the risk-focused arm of LSEG, has published global research showing that although nearly all compliance leaders trust their screening data, fewer than half believe they could readily hand a regulator a complete audit trail.
The study surveyed 600 senior risk and compliance decision-makers across EMEA, APAC and the United States. It found that 94% are confident their screening data is complete and up to date. Yet just 48% said producing a full audit trail would be very easy if a regulator challenged them, and 41% admitted their organisation is not entirely ready for heightened regulatory scrutiny.
LSEG Risk Intelligence calls this disconnect the “decision gap”. It describes the gap as the practical distance between spotting a potential risk and having the context, decision logic, accountability and evidence required to act on that risk and justify the action afterwards.
Manual checks remain a core part of the process. Some 93% of respondents cross-reference screening results with another source at least some of the time, and 69% do so frequently or always before acting. The research indicates that human review still matters in screening decisions, but that it also demands significant operational effort between the arrival of a risk signal and a decision that can be defended.
The findings also point to the need for strong data from both inside and outside the organisation. Internal data strength and availability were rated highly by 83% of respondents, and external reference data by 84%. However, only 76% rated both sources highly. When asked what they most wanted from better data quality, explainability and matching systems, respondents chose more confident and consistent screening decisions and stronger audit trails and regulatory evidence, each picked by 39%.
On the subject of AI-supported screening, respondents set out the safeguards they would need before trusting the resulting decisions more. Trusted, high-quality data led the list at 40%, followed by the ability to explain every decision to regulators at 37%, regular accuracy and performance testing at 36%, and keeping human review in the decision-making process at 35%.
The research concludes that confidence in AI-supported screening will rely on pairing suitable technology with trusted information, proven performance, explainability and human oversight.
LSEG group head of risk intelligence David Wilson said, “Compliance teams around the world are confident in the data they use, but confidence alone is not enough. Organisations need to connect trusted information, clear decision logic, human judgement, and accessible evidence so they can explain the actions they take.
“The opportunity is not simply to add more data or automation. It is to create a controlled route from a risk signal to a decision that remains explainable and defensible when it is examined months or years later.”
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