Banks and other organisations covered by anti-money laundering law face tighter standards if the recommendations of a Financial Action Task Force review of the global anti-money laundering (AML) system are implemented.Australia's AML regulator, Austrac, this week issued a consultation paper prepared by FATF, an inter-governmental body responsible for AML standards, which contains a series of recommendations aimed at addressing "deficiencies and emerging threats".The main recommendation spells out a number of more specific steps financial institutions must take to identify the beneficial owners of customer accounts.According to the consultation paper, there is a low level of compliance with current standards in this matter.The new standard would require the financial institution to have comprehensive information about natural persons exercising control through ownership interests. If ownership interests are widely dispersed, information would be required on the identity of the natural persons exercising control through other means.Some of the recommendations extend beyond AML law into trust and company law. FATF is proposing that trustees be given a legal obligation to obtain beneficial ownership information about trusts. It also recommends that nominee shareholders be licensed and that they be required to disclose the identity of their nominator to financial institutions.KPMG's national leader, investigations and integrity risk management, Gary Gill, said FATF was proposing a more detailed level of guidance but is not moving away from a risk-based approach to AML programs.Gill said: "The current risk-based system allows financial institutions to identify the extent to which they need to investigate a customer's circumstances."The recommendations are intended to give more guidance, but FATF is not moving away from a risk-based approach."Another recommendation is that financial institutions must have group-wide AML programs. FATF wants to make sure there is consistency in the approach of global organisations. It also wants to make sure that companies outsourcing data services are able to co-ordinate information transfer.