# Understanding AML screening results

Source: https://help.didit.me/aml-screening/how-aml-screening-works
Updated: 2026-10-12

AML screening checks a person against watchlists and returns a match score and a risk score. Setting those two thresholds well is what makes the results useful.

Every hit carries **two** scores, and confusing them is the main source of AML
pain. The **match score** asks "is this the same person?" The **risk score** asks
"how serious is it if it is?" The risk score drives the outcome. AML screening is
$0.20 per screen, paid from your plan credit or balance.

[Video: AML screening: sanctions, PEPs and adverse media - Didit Academy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7htTWCWsl60&t=520)

AML screening checks a person or company against sanctions, watchlist, and adverse media sources, and returns a risk-based result you can act on automatically or route for manual review.

## What gets screened

Each screening checks the entity against several source categories:

- **Sanctions lists** - government and international sanctions and travel-ban lists.
- **Politically exposed persons (PEP)** - individuals with prominent public roles, from heads of state down to relatives and close associates.
- **Criminal and law-enforcement records** - global and local databases, including wanted lists.
- **Adverse media** - news coverage of financial crime, fraud, or related issues.
- **Regulatory enforcement** - warnings, fines, and enforcement actions from financial regulators.

A hit can come from a watchlist database, from adverse media, or both. A person or company can appear in press coverage even when they aren't listed in a formal database, so treat an adverse-media-only hit as a genuine signal rather than a lesser one.

For the full source breakdown, see [what lists Didit screens against](https://help.didit.me/aml-screening/aml-lists-and-coverage).

## The two scores

This is the part worth internalising, because nearly every "why did this flag?" question resolves here.

**Match score** - is this hit actually the same person or company? Calculated from name, date of birth, nationality, and other identifying details. A common name against a large sanctions list produces many low-confidence candidate matches; low-confidence matches are automatically excluded.

**Risk score** - how serious is this if it is the same entity? Calculated from the category (sanctions versus PEP versus adverse media), the PEP tier, the crime type, and country risk.

The **risk score** determines the final status: approved, in review, or declined. Both thresholds are configurable per workflow.

## How the risk score is calculated

The risk score is a weighted average of three components, each scored 0 to 100:

| Component | Weight | What it measures |
|---|---|---|
| **Category** | 50% | Which kind of list the hit is on. Sanctions and top-tier PEPs score 100; a **Warnings and Regulatory** enforcement listing 80 to 95; lower PEP tiers 70 to 79; **adverse media alone 55 to 69** (typically 60) |
| **Country** | 30% | The AML/CFT risk of the entity's country on Didit's country table (Luxembourg or Germany in the twenties, high-risk jurisdictions far higher) |
| **Criminal records** | 20% | A court conviction scores 100 and an enforced criminal penalty 90. An administrative fine or a regulatory sanction is not a criminal record and scores 0 here |

The bands are fixed: **Low** below 30, **Medium** 30 to 49, **High** 50 and above. Which band lands in review or decline is set by your thresholds.

A worked example, because it comes up constantly: a company fined by a financial regulator, where the fine has been reported in the press but the entity is **not** on a regulator's enforcement list. The hit is adverse media only, so category is 60; a low-risk EU country gives roughly 23; no criminal record gives 0. That is (23 x 0.30) + (60 x 0.50) + (0 x 0.20), about 37: **Medium risk**. With the console's default thresholds (approve below 80) that still approves, so lower your review threshold if you want hits like this in front of a person. The same fine sourced from the regulator's own enforcement listing would score 95 on category and land in High. So "the sanction wasn't detected" usually means it *was* detected, from a different kind of source than you expected, and scored accordingly. Full detail: [AML risk score](https://docs.didit.me/core-technology/aml-screening/aml-risk-score).

> **Warning:** Setting the match threshold too low is the single most common cause of an
> unworkable AML queue. Lower it and you catch more true matches - and vastly more
> people who merely share a name with someone on a list. Start where the defaults
> are, measure your own false-positive rate, then adjust.

## Company and person screening are separate

For business verification, screening runs at two levels: the company itself, and every identified beneficial owner and officer individually. They're separate checks with separate prices - $0.20 each. See [how business verification works](https://help.didit.me/business-verification/business-verification-kyb).

## Screening without a full verification

If you only need a screen - no document, no selfie - you can call AML screening on its own rather than wrapping it in a full KYC workflow. A standalone API call is billed per call at the same $0.20, paid from your plan credit or balance, exactly like AML in a workflow.

## Ongoing monitoring

Once someone is approved, a one-time screen only tells you about the day it ran. Ongoing monitoring re-screens daily against updated lists and moves the session if something new crosses your threshold. See [ongoing AML monitoring](https://help.didit.me/aml-screening/ongoing-monitoring).

## What it costs

| | Price |
|---|---|
| AML screening (person or company) | $0.20 per screen |
| Ongoing AML monitoring | $0.07 per year |

AML is $0.20 per screen on top of the other checks, so a workflow that includes it uses your monthly credit faster - a frequent surprise for teams who budgeted only for the basic KYC checks. See [what the free plan includes](https://help.didit.me/getting-started/free-plan).

## Related

- [What lists Didit screens against](https://help.didit.me/aml-screening/aml-lists-and-coverage)
- [Working through AML hits](https://help.didit.me/aml-screening/resolving-aml-hits)
- [Ongoing AML monitoring](https://help.didit.me/aml-screening/ongoing-monitoring)