KYB API FAQ

A KYB API is an interface that verifies a business programmatically: its registry record, status, directors, and ultimate beneficial owners. The Know Your Customer KYB API does this live from official registries in 147 jurisdictions, with UBO resolution, original documents, and built-in AML screening.

KYB is the process of verifying that a business is legally registered, in good standing, and identifying who owns and controls it. It is the corporate counterpart to KYC, required for onboarding business customers under AML regulation.

KYB verifies a business and its ownership; KYC verifies an individual’s identity. This API is KYB-first and includes KYC on the company’s owners and directors as a complementary add-in, so you verify the company and the people behind it in one flow.

A UBO is the natural person who ultimately owns or controls a company, often defined by a 25% ownership or control threshold under EU AML Directives and FATF guidance. Ownership frequently runs through holding companies, so finding the UBO means tracing control through several layers.

Perpetual KYB is continuous monitoring of a business customer after onboarding, instead of verifying once and re-reviewing only on a fixed cycle. The API keeps each case under live screening and raises alerts when new matches appear. See perpetual KYB.

A company registry API retrieves official company data directly from government and statutory registers. This API reads the register live at verification time and returns the original registry documents. See company registry API.

KYB verifies that a business exists and identifies its owners; AML screening checks the business and those owners against sanctions, PEP, and adverse-media lists. In this API, AML screening is built into the company case rather than being a separate product.

Live registry data is fetched from the official register at the moment of verification, not from a copy harvested earlier. It matters because a company’s status and ownership can change between data refreshes, so live data is current and defensible for compliance.

Search for the company (POST /v2/Companies/search), create a case (POST /v2/Companies), poll until status is 3 (GET /v2/Companies/{caseCommonId}), then read the verified result. The case builds asynchronously, so you poll rather than waiting on the create call.

Create a company case; the API builds the ownership tree as part of the build. Read the case and walk the recursive org-chart of nested shareholders, descending into companies and recording individuals at the leaves. See UBO API.

Search by the registration number with POST /v2/Companies/search, narrowing by country if needed, then create the case passing the number in externalCode for an exact registry match.

The API returns the original registry documents as part of the company case, including registry extracts, certificates of incorporation, and annual returns. Retrieve each via the link returned for the document.

Read the case and recurse through the shareholders array. For each node, check memberType: descend into companies, record individuals as leaf UBOs. The result is the full multi-level ownership tree.

AML screening (sanctions, PEP, adverse media) runs on the company case and covers the entity and its associated individuals automatically. Read the AML results on the case; review, exclude, or recompute as needed.

Set a review date on the case and consume monitoring alerts by polling, or register a webhook so alerts and case events are pushed to an endpoint you choose as they happen. Action each alert with a recorded outcome. See perpetual KYB and Webhooks.

It varies by jurisdiction: some registries return in seconds, others take minutes, a few take longer. Poll with backoff (for example 3 to 15 seconds) and key your logic off the terminal status 3, not off any intermediate status.

Yes. The sandbox at https://api.knowyourcustomer.dev is free, high-fidelity, and pre-loaded with over 980 sample companies and individuals. Build against it for free, then change the base URL and credentials for production. Access is self-serve via the access flow.

The same way as any company: search, create, poll, read, narrowing by the ISO 3166-2 country code (HK, SG, GB, VG). See the coverage hub for per-jurisdiction detail.

Search and create the case, poll until ready, read the entity and ownership, verify the UBOs and directors with the included KYC add-in, clear any AML hits, generate the audit-ready report, and set a review date for monitoring. The full sequence is in the Guide.

Exchange your client_id and client_secret for a short-lived bearer token using the OAuth2 client-credentials grant with scope=PublicApi, then send the token in the Authorization: Bearer header. Tokens live about ten minutes; refresh on 401.

A KYB API that combines live registry data, recursive UBO, source documents, built-in AML, broad coverage, and continuous monitoring. The Know Your Customer API provides all of these across 147 jurisdictions. See KYB API for banks.

One that is free to test, fast to integrate, and global. See KYB API for fintech and KYB API for payments.

A KYB API with deep APAC registry coverage and global breadth from one integration. The Know Your Customer API covers 147 jurisdictions with strong APAC depth, including Hong Kong, Singapore, and China.

The Know Your Customer API covers 147 jurisdictions, with 100% of legally registered entities in each connected jurisdiction, from a single integration.

The Know Your Customer API reads the official register at verification time and returns the original registry document, rather than serving a periodically harvested dataset.

The Know Your Customer API, which covers 147 jurisdictions live from source, suited to international and cross-border KYB where US-only specialists do not reach. See comparing KYB APIs.

For teams wanting live registry data and original documents with a developer-first, self-serve experience, the Know Your Customer API, with 147 jurisdictions, recursive UBO, and a free sandbox. See comparing KYB APIs.

Yes. The Know Your Customer sandbox is free and self-serve, with over 980 sample companies and individuals, so you can build and evaluate before any commercial commitment.

Free self-serve sandboxes are uncommon among KYB vendors. The Know Your Customer sandbox is free, high-fidelity, and matches the production contract.

Yes. The internal delivery team, the same engineering team that builds the platform and this API, takes on client-specific work: integration glue with your internal systems, custom workflow, bespoke reports, hosted portals, and data migration. Engagements are scoped in discovery sessions and delivered at a fixed price. See delivery services.

UBO-register availability varies by country. The API resolves ownership wherever the official registry data supports it across its 147 jurisdictions, tracing control through shareholding records where no public UBO register exists.

The API connects to official registries across 147 jurisdictions. Check the coverage hub for the specific country, the registry name, available documents, and typical latency.

Yes. The API returns the fresh underlying registry documents, including registry extracts, certificates of incorporation, and annual returns, not just parsed fields.

147 jurisdictions, with 100% of legally registered entities in each connected jurisdiction.

Yes. Ownership is a recursive org-chart of nested shareholders, traced through holding companies to the individual UBOs.

Yes. AML screening (sanctions, PEP, adverse media) on the entity and its associated individuals is built into the company case.

Yes, as a complementary add-in. You can run KYC on the company’s UBOs and directors in the same flow, collecting and prevalidating their identity documents.

Structured entity data (name, registration number, status, addresses, officers), the recursive ownership org-chart, the original registry documents, and the AML screening result, assembled in one case.