FAQs

The Dedicated Online Financial Integrity Network (DOLFIN) is an e-learning platform and online workspace that offers comprehensive Counter-Illicit Finance (CIF) and Financial Crimes Compliance (FCC) educational resources and risk management tools to mitigate your institution’s FCC risk. DOLFIN delivers training, testing, certification, and continuing education solutions to meet enterprise-wide risk management needs in an intuitive and easily deployed user interface.

DOLFIN reflects the expertise of senior financial crimes risk and compliance professionals, including experts who spearheaded the post 9/11 counter-illicit finance regime in the United States and globally. We have our pulse on evolving illicit financing risks and corresponding global standards and regulatory expectations. With DOLFIN, you can upskill your teams, cross-train your staff, and maintain the knowledge to address enterprise-specific risks.

 AskFIN is an innovative AI-powered tool aimed at reimagining how financial integrity professionals experience and interact with compliance content by providing quick, clear answers to questions related to AML/CFT, sanctions, and other financial integrity topics. Built to support financial integrity professionals in their day-to-day jobs, AskFIN provides just-in-time learning, enhances productivity, and helps users to stay current on the latest regulatory developments and compliance requirements.

AskFIN integrates cutting-edge technology with the largest and most credible library of financial integrity resources, DOLFIN® (Dedicated Online Financial Integrity Network). Users ask a question and the AskFIN platform generates responses from trusted sources, all within a secure environment.

Organizations can also add their own policy documents for AskFIN to query and curate responses based on unique organizational processes and procedures. As the financial integrity mission is global, AskFIN was built with multilingual capabilities, meaning users can ask a question in any language and receive a localized answer in seconds, ideal for international teams.

Some examples of Ask FIN-powered research and workflows:

• Search for content with ease: AskFIN makes it easy to find the content you need on the DOLFIN platform, saving you time and effort.

• Stay up-to-date: Keep up-to-date on the latest developments in financial crime risk management with AskFIN, leveraging both evergreen content and daily news on all topics financial crime.

• Workflow assistance: AskFIN can also provide workflow assistance – such as drafting briefs for senior leadership or drafting a training outline for a multi-day AML/CFT training — helping you to streamline your processes and improve your efficiency.

• Prepare for exams: With AskFIN, you can prepare for exams with confidence, knowing that you have access to the most up-to-date and comprehensive content available.

• Financial institutions of all sizes
• Non-bank financial institutions, including money service businesses and investment firms
• New payment providers, financial technology firms, and virtual asset exchanges
• Government authorities, including financial intelligence units, prosecutors, and supervisory and law enforcement agencies
• Exporters, importers, and other businesses involved in cross-border transactions or those managing global supply-chain risks
• Individual financial crimes compliance and counter illicit finance (FCC/CIF) professionals
• Non-profit organizations
• Media and investigative professionals
• Academia and institutions who offer FCC/CIF training

The financial integrity community includes:

• Individuals and entities in the private sector engaged in “financial crimes compliance” (FCC) activities, including those responsible for monitoring, detecting and addressing financial crimes risk and complying with global standards and local laws, regulations, and guidance designed to safeguard the financial system from use by illicit actors; and
• Government authorities, multilateral organizations, and others engaged in “counter-illicit finance” (CIF) activities, including those responsible for setting standards and issuing and implementing laws, regulations, and guidance designed to safeguard the financial system from use by illicit actors.

Interactive Training Center

• Comprehensive Training Tailored to Your Audience or Challenge, including modules to address discrete compliance challenges for boards and senior executives, business lines, compliance, risk management, and audit functions.
• Designed to Support a Culture of Compliance and deploy across the enterprise to manage a broad range of obligations and expectations.
• Testing and Certification delivered in engaging, interactive, multi-media format to support enhanced knowledge and demonstrate proficiency in CIF/FCC topics to meet regulatory requirements.
• Management Reporting, generated on demand, to evaluate staff engagement and competencies and completion.

Expertly Curated Resource Center

• Interactive risk management tools for CIF/FCC professionals to help effectively mitigate risk.
• Analytical insights from expert practitioners on emerging policy developments from around the world and the implications for your institution.
• Comprehensive resources on AML/CFT, sanctions, fraud, ABC, and other CIF/FCC topics, providing timely and expert insights on global standards and considerations for practitioners.
• Forward-looking podcasts, webinars, and videocasts featuring global industry experts addressing emerging risks and regulatory and policy changes.
• Customizable content, capabilities, and functionality for enterprise clients.

Community Center

• Virtual collaboration and messaging space for financial integrity professionals around the world, including personalized feeds, and other dynamic features to create communities of interest where users can create and grow affinity groups to discuss shared, complex problems.
• Tailored, virtual environments for enterprises to internally communicate and share information.
• Customized daily news feed covering the latest and most salient financial integrity issues of the day.
• Expert-led Q&A sessions on critical compliance issues.
• Online calendar of upcoming events of interest to the financial integrity community.

DOLFIN currently offers fully customizable training, testing, and certification services on a full range of FCC/CIF topics to private and public-sector clients around the world, including:

• Courses to meet regulatory requirements. DOLFIN delivers best-in-class, expert-led foundational anti-money laundering and sanctions courses and more!
• E-Learning Plans—or role-specific training and continuing education plans—to help enterprises mitigate compliance risks. Supervisors can assign ELPs designed by DOLFIN’s financial integrity experts and/or create custom ELPs for their staff based on DOLFIN content, their own material, or a combination.
• Tests and assessments required to demonstrate knowledge and proficiency on financial crimes compliance topics. Enterprises can also deliver their own testing through the DOLFIN platform in both multiple choice and open answer format.
• Certifications designed and delivered by in-house global experts using analytic frameworks that make DOLFIN’s professional training unique in the market.

DOLFIN allows enterprises to quickly and easily configure e-Learning programs tailored to their specific needs. We can partner with you to design E-Learning Plans that will guide your users through a dynamic learning experience that includes written, audio, and video content, as well as knowledge checks and tests fully customizable to your enterprise needs.

E-Learning Plans are curated guides that provide role-specific or topic-specific training, continuing education, and other resources to help enterprises mitigate compliance risks. Supervisors can assign ELPs designed by DOLFIN’s financial integrity experts and/or create custom ELPs for their staff based on DOLFIN content, their own material, or a combination of both.

ELPs are assigned a specific number of hours of learning so that users and supervisors can monitor continuing education completion. ELP completion reports are available to supervisors for immediate download.

The DOLFIN Training Center delivers courses, E-Learning Plans, and tests. The platform currently offers a foundational AML course and a foundational U.S. Sanctions course with more courses on the way. DOLFIN also offers multiple E-Learning Plans and empowers supervisors to go beyond what is provided and build out their own plans for their staff. By leveraging the materials in the DOLFIN Resource Center, E-Learning Plans can be developed to cover a vast array of topics and targeted scenario-based training. Topics might include:

• BSA/AML/OFAC for new hires
• Annual BSA/AML/TF course for all employees
• Annual OFAC and Global Sanctions course for all employees
• Correspondent Banking Risks
• Trade Finance Risks
• Retail Banking Risks
• Know Your Customer
• Sanctions Screening
• AML Red Flags and SARS
• Fraud
• Anti-Bribery and Corruption
• Board and Senior Management

The following E-Learning Plans are currently available on DOLFIN:

• Financial Crimes Risk Management
• Foundations of AML
• Foundations of US Sanctions
• Correspondent Banking
• Financial Investigations
• Payments Flows and Third-Party Payment Processors
• Trade Finance
• Threat Finance Analyst
• TFS Guidelines for FIs, DNFBPs, and VASPs
• Virtual Currencies and Blockchain
• United Nations Sanctions Obligations and FATF Recommendations

How often will I need to re-certify, and what are the requirements for recertification?

Recertification is required every three years. In order to recertify the Certified Risk Management Specialist – Global Sanctions (CRMS-GS) credential, you must maintain an active DOLFIN membership and meet 30 Continuing Education (CE) credit requirements within a three-year cycle. We do not charge recertification fees.

• A minimum of 15 of the 30 CE credits must be specifically related to sanctions topics.
• The other 15 may be related to other financial integrity topics such as anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT), anti-bribery and corruption (ABC), and fraud.
• A minimum of 15 of the 30 credits must come from continuing education provided by DOLFIN Academy.

What qualifies for continuing education (CE) credit towards my recertification?

The following types of activities qualify for CE credits towards maintaining the CRMS-GS certification so long as they occur after you pass the certification exam and are related to sanctions, AML/CFT, or other financial integrity topics.

• Attendance at conferences, webinars, seminars, and other external and internal training sessions
• Serving as an instructor, speaker, panelist, or moderator at an industry-focused event
• Authoring published work
• Other activities will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

How will my CE credits be tracked and recorded?

CE credits earned from training DOLFIN (courses, e-learning plans, webinars, and instructional videos) are automatically tracked based number of minutes (50 minutes = 1 CE credit) and applied to your recertification.

• Tracking will commence as soon as you have completed the CRMS-GS certification. This is visible here: My User History | DOLFIN
• Courses, E-Learning Plans, webinars, and instructional videos all display the number of eligible CE credits you will receive once the item is successfully completed.
• You will only receive CE credit for completing each learning item once. For example, if the same video is present in multiple ELPs, it will mark as complete in all ELPs as soon as you watch the video the first time. The total amount of CE credits available for each ELP will automatically account for videos that have been watched previously.
• Videos watched on DOLFIN outside of an ELP or Course will only accrue CE credits if the video is 11minutes or longer in duration.

FIN Hub

• Policy alerts: Analytical insights on breaking events, such as new sanctions or FCC regulatory changes, evolving policies, and emerging risk vectors.
• Webinars: Timely live forums and panel discussions led by top FCC experts with deep experience addressing compliance professionals worldwide.
• Podcasts In-depth discussions of critical financial integrity issues by world class experts at DOLFIN Academy and other global authorities.

FIN Library

• Comprehensive and up-to-date reference materials on AML, CFT, sanctions, ABC, fraud, and other financial integrity topics, including:
  • AML/CFT vulnerabilities and typologies
  • Higher-risk gateway relationships, products, and customers
  • New financial and regulatory technologies
  • Sanctions program overviews on China, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Venezuela, Russia and other high-risk jurisdictions
  • Advanced AML/CFT and sanctions issues
  • Lessons learned from enforcement actions against financial institutions
  • Key considerations for financial institutions to effectively address FCC risks
  • Comprehensive resources designed for public sector authorities, including supervisors, financial intelligence units, investigators, and prosecutors

Toolkit

• Interactive applications to help compliance professionals easily track and implement evolving regulatory requirements, including a Red Flags Database, sanctions heat maps, digital currencies map, sanctions enforcement tracker, and Daily Digest.
• We’re also developing regulatory and enforcement trackers that will provide insights and actionable information on regulatory developments and enforcement actions globally.

• Material developments in the CIF/FCC space are generally reflected on DOLFIN within one week, and often sooner. This includes major regulatory changes with a potential impact on financial institutions and other businesses. New content is also made available on a regular basis, particularly in FINHub, which regularly features new analysis and commentary, including webinars, policy updates and podcasts on topical and current events.
• In addition, all content on DOLFIN is reviewed on a semi-annual basis to ensure that it accurately and completely reflects all relevant information for DOLFIN clients.

To access DOLFIN you will need:

• Internet connection
• Access to the DOLFIN site

We perform regular testing of DOLFIN using desktop computers, tablets and mobile devices on the following operating systems and internet browsers. If you have trouble accessing DOLFIN or content on DOLFIN, please contact our support team at support@dolfin.org.

• Operating systems:
  • Microsoft Windows
  • Mac OS
  • Android
• Internet browsers
  • Google Chrome
  • Mozilla Firefox
  • Microsoft Edge
  • Apple Safari

The DOLFIN Daily Digest delivers a comprehensive news brief to your desk every morning on global AML/CFT, sanctions, export controls, ABC, and other financial integrity developments. It helps compliance professionals monitor regulatory developments, enforcement actions, and related news in the industry, from around the world.

• The Daily Digest is presented in several different parts of DOLFIN:
  • The archive of past DOLFIN Daily Digests can be accessed via the Toolkit, under the Resource Center menu. Our archive goes back to early November 2020.
  • Each article from the Digest is presented as a post in the Community Center. You can share the post with any Sub Communities you are a member of to start a conversation. You can also search the Community Center for all DOLFIN Daily Digest items back to mid-December.
• When you open the current DOLFIN Daily Digest or an archived edition, the Table of Contents outlines the news within that specific day’s brief, sorted by topic. If you would like to see a specific article, click on the link within the Table of Contents. You will be redirected to a summary of the article and the link to the full article. Otherwise, you may scroll through the full news brief.

• For jurisdictional authorities:
  • Identify risks related to global sanctions programs and those of jurisdictions with global reach (e.g., UN, U.S., EU, UK)
  • Understand the exposure of jurisdictions, regulated entities, and institutions to sanctions-related risks from global, foreign, and domestic sources
  • Manage sanctions-related risks and exposure from programmatic and case-specific perspectives
• For private and non-profit sectors:
  • Create more effective workflows in addressing sanctions-related risks
  • Strengthen enterprise-wide confidence that compliance professionals will manage sanctions risks in accordance with the organization’s competitive risk appetite
  • Increase professional satisfaction among certified employees, thereby contributing to employee retention
• For individuals:
  • Become more accurate and efficient in identifying and managing sanctions-related risks
  • Fully grasp the critical role sanctions professionals play in addressing risks in an increasingly complex 21st century global environment
  • Increase promotion potential and expand opportunities for additional professional responsibilities

The CRMS-GS program comprises a self-study e-Learning Plan (ELP) with a final exam. The ELP comprises five Blocks of Learning:

• Overview and Foundations of Sanctions
• Major Sanctions Programs
• Sanctions Authorities and Effective Compliance Programs
• Identify, Assess, and Manage Sanctions Risks
• Sanctions Enforcement, Evasion Techniques, and Recent Developments

• Section 1 includes 30questions that test candidates on technical sanctions compliance issues, such as requirements and prohibitions associated with different types of sanctions programs, jurisdictional reach of various sanctions authorities, ownership and control issues, and elements of effective compliance programs.
• Section 2 includes 20 questions and presents hypothetical fact pattern scenarios regarding various sanctions programs, and candidates will be asked to apply K2 Integrity’s Sanctions Analytic Framework in order to analyze the scenarios and identify, assess, and manage sanctions risk presented in each fact pattern. It is recommended that you have a pen/pencil and paper ready to map-out these scenarios to better understand them and assist in responding to the question.

To pass the exam, you must get a score of 75%. Exam retakes can be purchased in the DOLFIN store.