Simon Academy

10/06/2026

Catch Me If You Can: a movie that doubles as an origin story for modern KYC and identity verification.

Frank Abagnale Jr. cashed millions in forged checks, impersonated a Pan Am pilot, a doctor, and a lawyer, and stayed ahead of the FBI for years. And he did not do it because he was a master forger.

He did it because nobody asked for proof.

Want the full compliance breakdown? Keep swiping 👉

What film or series do you want us to analyze next? 🎬

02/06/2026

The EU's AML landscape is changing, and AMLA is at the center of it.

The Anti-Money Laundering Authority is the EU's new central AML/CFT authority, headquartered in Frankfurt and designed to bring greater consistency to how AML rules are applied across the bloc. For years, supervision has been fragmented across national authorities, creating gaps that criminals could exploit. AMLA was created to help close those gaps through stronger coordination and oversight.

For compliance professionals across banks, payment institutions, crypto-asset service providers (CASPs), fintechs, investment firms, and other regulated entities, this means more consistent expectations across jurisdictions, closer scrutiny for high-risk firms, and a clearer set of technical standards to follow.

In this carousel, we cover what AMLA is, why it was created, what it does, and who should be paying attention.

What part of the EU AML package are you watching most closely?

21/05/2026

In compliance, mixing up certain terms can have real consequences for the quality of your work.

For instance, money laundering stages vs. predicate offenses.

They might seem similar, but they're not.

When you mix them up, it shows up in vague SARs that law enforcement can't act on. In risk assessments that miss the actual threat. In typology analysis that describes what happened without explaining why.

The difference between a confident AML professional and one who's still guessing often comes down to foundational distinctions like this one. The kind of thing that rarely gets covered properly in onboarding, but shapes every investigation, every escalation, every regulator conversation.

👉 Swipe through for a clear breakdown of what sets the two apart, and why getting it right matters more than you might think.

If you want to build this foundation properly and get certified while you're at it, our CAMS exam prep course is made for compliance professionals who want both theory and practical application. Link in the comments👇

What's a predicate offense you think gets overlooked in financial crime training?

13/05/2026

This week's compliance in pop culture analysis: Ozark! 🎬

A family relocates to rural Missouri and starts cleaning cartel money through a string of local businesses. A marina, a strip club, a funeral home, a casino.

It's fiction, but the playbook is very real.

Swipe through for our compliance breakdown of Ozark, from typologies to governance failures to the gatekeepers who should have stopped it sooner.

Which fictional money laundering operation feels most realistic to you?

06/05/2026

We're giving something back to our Facebook community.

Our Introduction to AML/CFT Screening course is completely free. No catch.

In 10 minutes, you'll cover what screening is, the different types, how the process works from data collection through to escalation, and the common pitfalls that undermine even well-designed compliance programs.

You'll also get a certificate on completion.

Consider it a starting point or a refresher if you've been in the field for a while.

Happy learning! 🤓

https://lms.simon.academy/course/introduction-to-aml-cft-screening

This course provides foundational knowledge on AML/CFT screening, a core element of compliance programs. It is designed for learners seeking a clear starting point before progressing to advanced anti-financial crime training. The course introduces the purpose of screening, explains the different typ...

28/04/2026

Here's something that trips up a lot of compliance professionals: cybersecurity and infosec are related, but they're not interchangeable.

The distinction matters more than most people realize, and it starts with three letters: CIA.

Swipe through to see how the two differ, and why it's worth knowing.

👉 Ready to go deeper? Explore our courses at www.simon.academy

23/04/2026

Happy World Book Day! 📚

To celebrate, we put together a reading list for compliance professionals who like to mix work with pleasure.

All in all, we selected five page-turners on fraud, governance failures, and financial crime. Whether you're new to compliance or years into it, these are the kinds of reads that change how you think about financial crime and compliance.

Which one is already on your shelf?

P.S. If you'd like to keep upskilling, check out our compliance training hub, full of accredited online courses designed to help you get better at your job: www.simon.academy

17/04/2026

We're excited to announce our partnership with PECB, a globally recognized certification body operating in over 150 countries 🎓

Through this partnership, Simon Academy now offers a growing range of PECB-accredited eLearning courses on our platform, including ISO/IEC 27001 Foundation, the internationally recognized standard for Information Security Management.

What's included:
✅ Expert-led, self-paced video training
✅ Online exam + internationally recognized PECB certificate
✅ Study anytime, anywhere

This is just the beginning. More PECB courses are being added to Simon Academy regularly, follow us to be the first to know.

🔗 Start learning today: https://lms.simon.academy/courses

16/04/2026

Anna Delvey and her antics were everywhere a few years ago.

How did a regular girl with no real money, no verified identity, and forged documents manage to fool banks, law firms, and New York's elite for four years?

We broke it down for our compliance audience in the latest edition of Compliance in Pop Culture.

Where did the due diligence fail, who was supposed to catch it, and what does it mean for how you run your own CDD process?

👉 Swipe through for the full breakdown.

10/04/2026

Pablo Escobar's operation relied on financial system access.

And in many cases, that access wasn't forced, but enabled by weak KYC, absent transaction monitoring, and institutions that weren't asking the right questions.

In this edition of Compliance in Pop Culture, we look at Narcos through a compliance lens: where the gatekeeping failed, why culture played a bigger role than most people realize, and what the parallels are to gaps that still show up in regulatory findings today.

👉 Swipe through if you work in AML, KYC, or financial crime compliance.

What's the biggest AML red flag you think gets overlooked in practice?