Sourcing KYB data

Know Your Business (KYB) is a set of due diligence processes and procedures that organizations use to verify and authenticate the identity of their corporate clients, business partners, suppliers, and other entities with whom they engage in financial transactions or business relationships. It enables organizations to assess the risk associated with business relationships, detect and report suspicious activities, and comply with regulatory mandates, ultimately contributing to the prevention of money laundering and terrorist financing.

An integral component of KYB regulatory requirements is entity verification and sourcing company data in real time from authoritative primary sources, approved by respective regulators. Identifying the adequate primary source(s) in various jurisdictions is a key added value of the expertise of our KYB data team. Aside from closely monitoring relevant national legislation related to anti-money laundering, we verify the sources against the Global Legal Entity Identifier Foundation (GLEIF) Registration Authority List, the European Business Registers Association, the Corporate Registers Forum, the International Association of Commercial Administrators, etc. We also work closely with clients to advise on the adequate sources and align on the sourcing expectations.

In most countries KYB data can be obtained from a single centralized business register. However, in some jurisdictions, in order to provide comprehensive KYB data coverage, we are connected to multiple sources based on legal classification or geographical coverage parameters.

In certain jurisdictions various authorities are responsible to register and provide data on different legal forms. Therefore, for example:

    In the case of Australia, we are connected to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC). However, in order to provide coverage for trusts, sole traders and partnerships, which are not available in ASIC, we are also connected to the Australian Business Register (ABR).
    In Austria, we are connected to three different sources to cover all available legal forms:
    • Ministry of Justice (Firmenbuch) – a commercial register, which maintains official records of companies and business entities operating in Austria;
    • Associations Register (Vereinsregister) – a register for associations and nonprofit organizations;
    • GISA (Gewerbeinformationssystem Austria) – an information system that provides data related to commercial activities, used for retrieving sole trader data.
    In Czechia, we provide a live connection to the Ministry of Justice, which operates the register on legal entities and certain natural persons, but also to the Trade Licensing Register in order to provide data on sole traders.
    In the United Kingdom, we are connected to Companies House, the executive agency of the British Government that maintains the register of companies and is responsible for incorporating all forms of companies in the United Kingdom, as well as to the Charity Commission for England and Wales, which is responsible for maintaining an accurate and up-to-date register of charities.

When it comes to geographical and jurisdictional coverage, in the United States, for example, business registration falls under state authority. Therefore, business registers are maintained at the state level, and there is no centralized federal company register. Similarly, in Canada, companies must typically register with the appropriate provincial or territorial government authority, depending on where they plan to operate. Each province and territory in Canada has its own registry for businesses. However, in Germany for example, regardless of the fact that business registration is under the authority of the federal states, company data is provided through a centralized platform, the Handelsregister.

In some cases, different authorities are responsible for providing different data sets on the same entity. For example, in the case of France, we are connected to the Institut national de la propriété industrielle (INPI), which took over the authority as official distributor of data from the official company register (Le Registre national des entreprises) on 1 January 2023. However, in order to retrieve shareholder data on French companies, we are connected to Infogreffe, which is the data dissemination arm of the French Commercial Court Clerks.

 Here you can see a full list of our sources per jurisdiction.

Our KYB data expert team is available for further details and consults. Please don’t hesitate to contact us at  ma_kom_coverage@moodys.com .