Banks play a critical role in identifying financial fraud and protecting their older customers against related losses, Comptroller of the Currency Thomas Curry said in a speech Friday in Washington, D.C. He noted that bankers are helping to flag elder fraud by filing Suspicious Activity Reports with the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, as well as by enhancing training and improving marketing and education materials to raise awareness of fraud schemes.
Since 2011 — when FinCEN issued guidance requesting SARs on elder fraud — depository institutions have filed more than 27,000 SARs involving suspected elder abuse, Curry said. He urged banks to share SARs with state and federal law enforcement.
“In a recent report, FinCEN observed that the narratives that filers provided in SARs revealed that bankers were careful to assess suspicious transactions, often questioning an elderly customer if a transaction appeared out of character,” Curry said. “I am also pleased with FinCEN’s conclusion that many banks have incorporated elder financial exploitation guidance into their compliance monitoring programs.”
