Finsure has turned away 13 prospective brokers in the first six weeks of operating Sentinel, an artificial intelligence (AI) risk assessment tool built to detect fraud threats before applicants join its network.
The company said that in every case, Sentinel uncovered association risks that a standard surface-level check may not have caught.
Built in-house, the tool draws together multiple data points to map connections that are not immediately obvious but may point to past misconduct. The checks span a broker’s track record, identity, and potential conflicts of interest, as well as the people and entities they are linked to. That includes known problematic entities, undisclosed associates, and referral partners such as accountants.
Assessments follow set procedures for consistency, and are designed to catch issues at onboarding rather than after problems surface.
Finsure chief executive Simon Bednar (pictured) said Sentinel was not designed to flag every broker with a remote link to a questionable party.
“This is precision intelligence that augments better decision-making for our people, from the outset,” he said.
The launch comes as the broking industry contends with fraud that is more sophisticated and more organised, often spanning several institutions and complex webs of relationships.
Regulators have highlighted the scale of the problem. The Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (AUSTRAC) has referred hundreds of brokers, lawyers, accountants, and high-risk companies to authorities through its Operation Claw investigation into mortgage fraud. AUSTRAC chief executive Brendan Thomas said suspicious funds were reaching the mortgage market through established referral pathways.
Bednar said criminal groups were exploiting gaps in how institutions share intelligence.
“Sentinel gives us the ability to see connections and patterns that isolated institutions usually can’t,” he said.
Bednar called the tool another example of Finsure’s heavy investment in compliance and governance. He also argued that screening out bad actors at the door benefits legitimate brokers, who could otherwise be drawn into investigations because of indirect associations within a network. The tool protects customers, lenders, and the business, he said, but “it also protects good brokers”.
Scrutiny of how brokers are overseen is also set to increase. The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has flagged a review of lender oversight of brokers in its 2026–27 banking sector priorities letter, with work expected to begin in the third quarter of the 2026–27 financial year.
Finsure plans further upgrades to Sentinel’s detection capabilities and intends to integrate it with industry intelligence frameworks. It is also taking part in industry discussions on information sharing, and Bednar said the company would pass on what it learned to its brokers and the broader sector.
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