KYC providers: where Cairn fits
KYC means know your customer. It can include checking identity documents, finding who owns a business, screening names against sanctions lists, and reviewing risk over time. Those are different jobs. Cairn's free screen handles one of them: checking names against a defined set of public lists.
Use Cairn when you want to ask about a company in Signal or WhatsApp, see what was checked, and ask questions about the result. You don't need to connect an API. You can keep your existing KYC platform and use Cairn for an additional, clearly scoped check.
Choose by the job you need done
- Checking one company? Start with free Text Cairn. The default screen covers one company and up to 10 people you name.
- Have a larger list, your own policy, or a required report format? Talk to Hire Cairn about the work and a quote.
- Need to verify customer IDs, establish business ownership, or run broader risk checks? Choose a provider for that job. Examples are below.
What you get from Cairn
The screen reports potential matches, sources checked, and gaps. You can ask follow-up questions, request the saved report in PDF, Markdown or ZIP, and ask for a repeat screen. Scheduled repeats are part of the free workflow; they are not the same as continuous monitoring for changes to source lists.
The default coverage includes US OFAC, UK, EU and UN sanctions lists, US export-control lists and federal exclusions. It does not establish someone's identity or who owns a company. It does not check politically exposed persons, usually called PEPs, or adverse media, meaning news about possible wrongdoing. Read the full coverage and limits.
A possible match needs review. “No candidate found” means no candidate was returned from the sources checked for that screen. It does not clear a company or person. The real Signal example shows a result and the follow-up that explains its limits.
Identity documents and liveness
If your customers must submit an ID and prove they are the person holding it, look at identity verification providers. Persona documents government ID checks and selfie comparisons. Sumsub documents ID verification and liveness checks, alongside screening and other onboarding tools. Cairn's name screen does not perform these checks.
Business identity and ownership
Know your business, or KYB, can require registration checks and identifying the people who own or control a company. Middesk describes business identity, ownership and risk checks. If those records are required for your decision, use a provider with the relevant jurisdiction coverage. Cairn resolving a company name is not an ownership investigation.
Broader risk screening and monitoring
ComplyAdvantage documents sanctions, PEP and adverse-media screening with ongoing monitoring. Sigma360 describes sanctions, PEP, ownership-risk and adverse-media coverage. Its API documentation covers screening and monitoring, while filter-set administration and review workflows use its web interface.
OpenSanctions provides sanctions, PEP and other risk data for research and screening. It is also an option for teams building their own checks. The coverage and operating work differ from asking Cairn over chat. Check the datasets and access terms you need.
Consider these options when the required scope goes beyond Cairn's current public-list screen. Compare source coverage, monitoring behavior and review tools against your actual requirements.
Connecting an onboarding process
Orchestration means connecting checks and deciding what happens next. Alloy describes a platform that routes data and vendor calls through onboarding and ongoing risk workflows. That is useful when you need multiple providers and a managed decision process. A chat screen does not replace that system.
Having the work done for you
Hire Cairn is for a defined piece of screening work. We agree on the inputs, sources, policy, output and price. A person at CMD+RVL checks the work against that agreement. Your team keeps responsibility for reviewing findings and deciding what to do.
Tell Cairn if a missing source would make the screen more useful. We use feedback to decide which datasets and policies to add. A dataset on our roadmap is not part of your screen until it is available and included in the stated coverage.
How we made this comparison
Written by CMD+RVL, which makes Cairn and sells Hire Cairn. Reviewed October 13, 2026. Provider descriptions come from the official pages linked above. They are documented capabilities, not results from testing those products. We tested Cairn screening and an existing user's Signal conversation; we have not tested these providers side by side or measured comparative accuracy, speed or savings.
These are examples by job, not a ranking or a complete provider list. Products span categories. Coverage, account access and commercial terms need checking for your use case. We do not compare prices here; trials and startup programmes can have separate eligibility and limits.
Choose Signal or WhatsApp on the signup page. New users may need to wait for access. See how the free screen works.