The latest developments in the Asia-Pacific region around compliance and the fight against illicit money.

UK-headquartered compliance risk and fraud solutions firm TruNarrative has entered a partnership with Credit Bureau Malaysia, a business working with companies at a time when Malaysia has been at the centre of storm about illicit money.

The partnership brings the UK firm’s financial crime management proposition to the Malaysian market. CBM will, as a result, add services to its credit report offering including areas such as identity verification, know-your-client and anti-money laundering compliance.

The announcement is very timely as it comes as the threat of a change in the fraud landscape in Malaysia is likely, amid data breaches on a number of fronts, the firms said.

Malaysia has also seen concerns about money laundering and illicit fund transfers rise amid claims that money has been siphoned off from the state-run 1MDB fund and channelled via private banks and other entities. Already, the 1MDB affair has seen banks kicked out of hubs such as Singapore and the launch of investigations by a number of countries.

“The CBM and TruNarrative mission is to bring the fraud prevention teams together from across the sectors at risk, and prove that operating as a joined-up consortium is the most effective option for defending against the fraud activity that follows high-volume data breaches,” the firms said in a statement.

TruNarrative was founded in 2016; its head office is in Leeds, with other offices in London, New York, Hong Kong and Singapore. CBM was founded in 2008 and is a credit bureau for small- and medium-sized enterprises.