For years, banks, financial service and investment companies, and exporters have been required to follow know-your-customer (KYC) processes to thwart criminal activity. Developed to help certain businesses comply with anti-money laundering and anti-terrorism regulations, these programs aren’t mandated for most nonfinancial businesses. But you might want to consider adopting some KYC principles anyway. They can help you prevent fraud — including occupational fraud and identity theft — and even boost your marketing and sales efforts. Enhanced due diligence As part of their KYC processes, financial institutions generally verify customers’ names, addresses, and dates of birth and check them against lists of known criminals. In addition, they monitor transaction trends and high-risk accounts to determine their risk and whether they merit filing suspicious activity reports with the government....