What is a sanctions screening program?

A sanctions screening program is the documented set of policies, procedures, and tools that check counterparties before transactions.

TL;DR

TL;DR: A screening program combines written policy, a screening tool, and a record of decisions, applied consistently before every transaction.

Policies and procedures

A screening program starts with written policy: who must be screened, which lists apply, and what happens when a check returns a flag. Procedures translate that policy into steps an engineer or an operations team can follow, such as block the payment and open a review when a counterparty is flagged.

The screening tool

The second component is the tooling. A screening API such as sanctionsai.dev turns the procedure into one HTTP call that returns ALLOW or BLOCK in under 100 ms, checking both the 19,218 names on the SDN list and 947 OFAC-listed crypto wallets. An automated tool is more consistent than a manual search of a PDF, and it scales to agent-driven payments.

Records and review

The third component is the record. Every check should be logged with a timestamp, the counterparty, and the outcome, and the program should be reviewed on a schedule. Under strict liability, intent is not required, so the documented program is your defense that screening was actually performed.

The four gates

A screening program maps naturally onto a four-gate flow: SCREEN the counterparty, SCORE the risk, STOP when flagged, and STAMP the decision into the log. This structure gives every transaction a documented path from check to record, which is exactly the evidence a strict-liability regime asks you to produce.