Banks may get new grounds for blocking accounts of Volgograd residents

Rosfinmonitoring proposes to give banks the right to block citizens’ accounts if their name and date of birth partially coincide with the data of persons from the stop lists. The measure is designed to close loopholes for attackers who deliberately distort the spelling of names and surnames to circumvent sanctions.

The amendment is planned to be introduced into the law on combating money laundering and financing of terrorism. The draft document (No. 01/05/09-26/00170956) was posted on the portal of draft normative legal acts on September 9.

If the rule is adopted, banks will be able to suspend operations on the account for five working days. During this time, it will be decided whether to extend the restrictions or remove the blocking if it was introduced by mistake.

Experts are concerned that because of the innovation, the number of erroneous blockings may increase, especially people with common surnames will be affected. Experts insist that the mechanism of appeal of restrictions was as prompt as possible: in case of erroneous blocking, access to funds must be restored within a few hours.

The initiative is currently under public discussion. After finalization, the document will be sent for consideration to the State Duma.