Sanctions Screening Intelligence - OFAC SDN

Screen companies, individuals, and entities against the OFAC Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) list at $0.05 per query — replacing enterprise tools like World-Check ($10K–$80K/yr) for teams that need AML and sanctions compliance data on demand.

What does Sanctions Screening Intelligence do?

Sanctions Screening Intelligence downloads the live OFAC SDN list directly from the US Department of the Treasury and performs fuzzy-match screening against every entry. Each query returns a risk assessment (clear, possible match, probable match, or confirmed match) with a numeric match score, so you can tune sensitivity to your compliance threshold.

The Actor parses the full SDN XML file — which covers thousands of individually sanctioned persons, companies, vessels, and aircraft across dozens of active sanctions programs — and runs your query against all entries including alternate names and aliases. Results include the matched entity's designation date, sanctions program codes, nationality, and a direct link to the Treasury's published list for audit trail purposes.

Five modes cover different operational needs: single entity screening with detailed match analysis, batch screening of multiple names in one run, program-level lookup to enumerate all entities under a specific sanctions program (e.g., IRAN, CUBA, SDGT), country-level filtering to retrieve all SDN entries associated with a given country, and a summary overview dashboard with total entity counts and program statistics.

Key features

• Live OFAC SDN data — fetches directly from the US Treasury (treasury.gov) on every run, no stale cache
• Fuzzy name matching — configurable match threshold (0–100) to catch name variations, transliterations, and aliases
• 5 screening modes — entity screen, batch screen, program lookup, country sanctions, and sanctions overview
• Risk assessment output — clear, possible_match, probable_match, or confirmed_match classification with top score
• Alias and AKA matching — SDN entries include alternate names; the actor matches against all of them
• Batch screening — pass a comma-separated list of names and receive one result object per entity
• Program-level enumeration — list every entity sanctioned under a specific OFAC program code
• Country filtering — retrieve all SDN entries for a specific country (e.g., Russia, Iran, North Korea)
• Audit-ready output — includes total entries searched, match count, data source citation, and SDN publication metadata
• No API key required — OFAC SDN list is freely downloadable from the US Treasury

Use cases

• Financial institutions: Screen new customers and counterparties against OFAC SDN as part of KYC/AML onboarding workflows
• Trade compliance teams: Verify suppliers, buyers, and freight partners before executing cross-border transactions
• Legal and consulting firms: Run sanctions checks on clients and adverse parties as part of due diligence engagements
• Fintech and payments companies: Integrate automated SDN screening into payment approval pipelines via the Apify API
• HR and hiring teams: Screen executive candidates against global sanctions lists before senior appointments
• Real estate and investment firms: Check beneficial owners and deal counterparties for sanctions exposure

How to use Sanctions Screening Intelligence

1. Configure input — Select a screening mode, then provide a query name for entity screen, a comma-separated list for batch screen, a program code (e.g., IRAN, CUBA, SDGT) for program lookup, or a country name for country sanctions mode. Set the match threshold (default 70) to control sensitivity.
2. Run the Actor — Click "Start" in Apify Console or call via the Apify API
3. Get structured results — Output is pushed to the Apify dataset as structured JSON

Input parameters

Parameter	Type	Required	Default	Description
mode	string	Yes	entity_screen	Screening mode: entity_screen, batch_screen, program_lookup, country_sanctions, or sanctions_overview
query	string	No	Banco Nacional De Cuba	Entity name to screen in entity_screen mode
names	string	No	—	Comma-separated list of names for batch_screen mode
program	string	No	—	OFAC program code for program_lookup mode (e.g., IRAN, UKRAINE-EO13662, SDGT)
country	string	No	—	Country name for country_sanctions mode (e.g., Iran, Russia, Cuba)
matchThreshold	integer	No	70	Minimum match score (0–100). Lower = more results, higher = fewer false positives
limit	integer	No	50	Maximum number of results to return (1–500)

Output example

{
  "mode": "entity_screen",
  "query": "Banco Nacional De Cuba",
  "sdnMetadata": {
    "publishDate": "2026-03-20",
    "totalEntries": 12847
  },
  "totalEntriesSearched": 12847,
  "matchCount": 3,
  "riskAssessment": {
    "riskLevel": "confirmed_match",
    "topScore": 98,
    "recommendation": "CONFIRMED MATCH — Entity found on OFAC SDN list. Do not proceed."
  },
  "matches": [
    {
      "name": "BANCO NACIONAL DE CUBA",
      "type": "Entity",
      "program": ["CUBA"],
      "nationality": "Cuba",
      "designationDate": "1963-07-08",
      "matchScore": 98,
      "matchedOn": "primary_name",
      "sdnId": "10001",
      "remarks": "Cuba; Gender Male"
    },
    {
      "name": "BANCO NACIONAL DE CUBA",
      "type": "Entity",
      "program": ["CUBA"],
      "nationality": "Cuba",
      "matchScore": 92,
      "matchedOn": "aka_name"
    }
  ],
  "dataSources": ["OFAC SDN List — US Department of the Treasury"],
  "timestamp": "2026-03-21T10:00:00.000Z"
}

Pricing

Each successful screening run costs $0.05 under Apify's pay-per-event model. You only pay when results are successfully delivered. Failed runs are not charged. Learn more about pay-per-event pricing.

Batch screening multiple names in one run counts as a single event. 1,000 screening operations cost $50, compared to World-Check at $10,000–$80,000 per year.

API and integrations

Call this Actor via the Apify API to embed sanctions screening into your onboarding flows, schedule nightly re-screens of your customer database, or connect results to Slack for compliance team alerts. Results are available as JSON, CSV, or Excel from the Apify dataset.

Limitations

• This Actor screens against the OFAC SDN list only. It does not cover the EU Consolidated Sanctions List, UN Security Council List, or other national sanctions regimes.
• Fuzzy matching reduces false negatives from name variations but cannot guarantee detection of all sanctioned entity aliases, particularly in non-Latin scripts.
• The OFAC SDN file is large; each run downloads the full list. Expect run times of 30–90 seconds depending on Apify infrastructure load.