DDIQ Identifies Hidden Reputational Risk Pre-IPO

ISSUE

Exiger Client: Company nearing Initial Public Offering (IPO)

Subject: Well-respected journalist, Pulitzer Prize Winner in preparation for its IPO, and Exiger client needed to perform due diligence on a high-profile subject being considered as an independent director/trustee.

ACTION

• Identify and assess inherent risk-related aspects of the business from a different perspective;
• DDIQ flagged an individual with the same name as a possible reputational issue.
• The hit was from a legal opinion filed in a 1970 federal criminal case brought against an individual with the same name as the subject.
• The individual was arrested in 1970 by federal customs agents for attempting to smuggle 600 pounds of hashish into the country.
• Upon further research, Exiger came to the conclusion that the individual named in the criminal filing was the same subject.

Regular media searches with the adverse term string did not identify the U.S. federal criminal court case document, due to Google’s search algorithm, while online federal court records do not exist prior to the mid 1980s.

IMPACT

• After several phone calls and discussions with the client and their outside counsel, the client dropped the subject from consideration to be on the company’s board.
• DDIQ, combined with Exiger’s team of diligence experts, successfully flagged, identified, and mitigated the firm’s reputational risk, otherwise obfuscated by traditional methods.

ABOUT DDIQ

DDIQ is a compliance technology that accelerates and enhances the ability to assess risk regarding individuals and corporations related to investments, transactions, third parties and counterparties; and is relied upon by many of the world’s leading financial institutions and corporations. The ability to effectively apply AI to compliance processes is a revolutionary advancement. DDIQ harnesses the power of machine-learning and natural language processing to transform routine and difficult tasks and, thereby, accelerate and enhance critical Know Your Customer (KYC), due diligence and reputational risk management practices with exceptional cost savings.