With text messages and emails under tightened surveillance, financial firms may now have to screen staff video calls for possible rule-breaking, amid concern regulators are poised to scrutinise such calls for compliance breaches.
So far, a sector-wide crackdown led by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has focused on business-related text messages over unauthorised platforms, such as WhatsApp, which went untracked and unrecorded by regulated firms, largely during COVID-19 lockdowns when thousands of employees were working from home.
The SEC declined to comment for this story but two people with knowledge of the U.S. investor probes said they were concerned the SEC would expand recording requirements to Zoom calls, or similar forms of communication.
Finance firms are now engaging technology specialists, law firms and risk consultants to ensure video calls are monitored and retained as required, to meet record-keeping requirements and manage risks such calls could be used to share non-public information illegitimately, a dozen sources told Reuters.
Source: WhatsApp clampdown highlights video call compliance threat for finance firms | Reuters
