Alert Suppression Guide

Alert suppression helps your team reduce repeated sanctions, PEP, and adverse media noise for profiles that stay on ongoing monitoring. Access: Requires the Admin role or above. In the sidebar, go to Administration > Configuration, then open Alert suppression under Screening behaviours. Use this guide when you need to:

• understand how repeated monitoring alerts are grouped for the same profile
• choose between the built-in suppression presets
• create or maintain organization presets for your operating model
• tune the matching rules that control when repeated alerts stay visible or are suppressed
• review change confirmations, deployment history, and rollback options

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Before You Begin

• confirm your screening is managed in Minerva with profiles, not only as one-off searches through the API
• confirm the profiles are actively part of your ongoing monitoring workflow with monitored statuses
• confirm you have access to organization-level Screening configuration with role Admin or above
• review the Screening Guide if you need a refresher on profile and alert review workflows

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How Alert Suppression Works

Alert suppression is designed for repeated monitoring on the same profile. At a high level, Minerva:

1. uses the profile as the persistent reference for the screened subject
2. compares a new monitoring result to prior matched results for that same profile
3. evaluates the configured rules for name, date of birth, location, adverse media article similarity, and source changes
4. decides whether the new result should stay visible as a fresh alert or be treated as repeat noise

This means alert suppression is most useful after the initial onboarding or first screening event. Once a profile exists, Minerva can compare later screening results against that profile’s existing monitoring history.

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Main Configuration Page

The Alert Suppression page combines four ideas in one place:

• the global on or off state for suppression
• the built-in or organization preset that acts as the baseline
• the advanced rule controls that tune repeat-detection behavior
• the change-review and history tools used to deploy, audit, and roll back updates

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Preset And Suppression State

At the top of the page, Minerva shows:

• Alert suppression enabled: turns live suppression on or off for the organization
• Ruleset preset: selects the preset that provides the current baseline
• Current display state: shows whether the current draft still matches a saved preset or has drifted to Custom

If you start from a built-in or organization preset and then tune individual controls, the display state can switch to Custom even while the draft remains anchored to the original preset for comparison. For most organizations, this section will already show Alert suppression enabled with Built-in: Balanced selected, because Balanced is the shipped default configuration.

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Organization Presets

In addition to the built-in presets, each organization can maintain its own reusable presets. Organization presets let you:

• save a custom draft as a reusable preset
• rename a preset and update its description
• overwrite a preset with the current draft values
• delete a preset from the library without deleting the live alert suppression configuration

Use preset names and descriptions to capture the operational context, such as:

• the risk posture the preset supports
• the business unit or review workflow it was designed for
• the reason the preset exists

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Built-In Presets

Minerva includes three built-in presets. Built-in presets stay fixed. Balanced is the default preset and is already enabled for all organizations unless an administrator has changed the configuration. Use the other presets only when you have a clear reason to move away from that default baseline.

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Conservative

Use Conservative when your team prefers broader analyst visibility and wants to suppress only the clearest repeats. Key behavior:

• uses stricter name and location matching so only stronger repeats are grouped
• keeps date-of-birth matching tight and still expects exact month and day when both are present
• requires more corroborating identity evidence before suppression is allowed
• keeps name-only repeat behavior narrow, with a more limited focus on PEP noise
• keeps adverse media more sensitive by treating any new article as alert-worthy and requiring a shared location when both records include one

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Balanced

Use Balanced when you want the default Minerva posture for repeated sanctions, PEP, and adverse media monitoring noise. Key behavior:

• uses moderate name and location matching designed to reduce repeated monitoring noise without grouping too aggressively
• keeps date-of-birth checks tight when that information is present
• requires meaningful corroborating identity evidence before suppression
• applies name-only repeat behavior across Sanctions, PEP, and News
• keeps adverse media visible when an article appears materially different, while suppressing closer repeat coverage

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Aggressive

Use Aggressive when recurring monitoring results create significant repeat noise and you want broader suppression. Key behavior:

• uses broader name and location matching so more recurring noise is grouped as repeat activity
• allows more date-of-birth flexibility than the other built-in presets
• still expects corroborating identity evidence, but is more willing to suppress repeated noise once that evidence is present
• applies broader name-only repeat behavior across Sanctions, PEP, and News
• treats adverse media most aggressively by suppressing additional article churn after the same subject has already been established

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Shared Defaults Across The Built-In Presets

All three built-in presets start with:

• a recent-history lookback window for repeat comparison
• Sanctions new-source alert turned off
• PEP new-source alert turned off

Turn on the new-source alerts only when you want Minerva to re-surface same-identity sanctions or PEP matches after genuinely new source labels appear.

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Understanding Algorithms And Scores

Most similarity rules use a normalized score from 0.00 to 1.00.

• a score closer to 1.00 means the two values look more similar
• a higher threshold is usually stricter, so fewer borderline repeats will be suppressed
• a lower threshold is usually broader, so more repeated noise may be grouped together

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Algorithm Guidance

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How To Think About Higher And Lower Values

• Similarity thresholds: higher means stricter matching and usually fewer suppressions
• History window: higher means Minerva looks farther back and can suppress more recurring noise
• Date-of-birth year window: higher means more year drift is tolerated
• Minimum corroborating signals: higher means stronger identity evidence is required before suppression
• Minimum matching locations: higher means more location corroboration is required
• New-source minimums: higher means more new sources must appear before a fresh sanctions or PEP alert is shown

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Rule-By-Rule Controls

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History Window

Use Previous searches to scan to control how far back Minerva looks for prior matched monitoring results.

• range: 1 to 10 previous searches
• higher values usually suppress more recurring alerts
• lower values keep older prior results from influencing the decision

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Name Similarity

Use the Algorithm and Similarity threshold controls to decide how closely a new result name or alias must resemble a prior one before Minerva treats it as the same repeat.

• threshold range: 0.00 to 1.00
• higher threshold: stricter name matching
• lower threshold: broader name grouping

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Date Of Birth

Use these controls when date-of-birth evidence matters to your review process:

• Allowed DOB window (+/- years): range 0 to 10
• Require exact month/day when both are present: adds a stricter check whenever both records include month and day detail

Use tighter settings when date of birth is usually complete and reliable. Use looser settings only when the data sources often carry partial or slightly inconsistent DOB information.

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Location Similarity

Use the location controls when geography helps distinguish repeated results for the same subject.

• Location similarity threshold: range 0.00 to 1.00
• Minimum matching locations: range 1 to 5

Raise the threshold or the minimum count when you want more geographic corroboration before suppression.

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Strong Identity

Use Minimum corroborating signals to control how many strong identity signals must align before Minerva allows suppression.

• range: 1 to 3 corroborating signals
• higher values make suppression more conservative
• lower values make suppression easier to trigger

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Name-Only Repeat

Use this rule when you want Minerva to suppress repeated name-only noise even when date of birth or location evidence is limited. Controls:

• Name-only repeat threshold: range 0.00 to 1.00
• Feeds: choose from Sanctions, PEP, and News

If no feeds are selected, Minerva will not apply the name-only repeat rule until at least one feed is chosen.

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Adverse Media

Adverse media has the richest set of controls because Minerva needs to decide both whether the subject looks like the same person or organization and whether the article looks like the same story. Controls:

Article treatment options:

• Any new articles alert: use this when every new adverse media article should still appear for review
• Only dissimilar articles alert: use this when near-duplicate coverage should usually be suppressed but materially different stories should remain visible
• No new articles alert: use this only when repeated article churn should be heavily suppressed after Minerva has already established the same subject

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Sanctions New-Source Alert

Use this control when the same monitored identity should alert again only if additional sanctions source labels appear.

• status toggle: on or off
• Minimum new sanctions sources: range 1 to 10

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PEP New-Source Alert

Use this control when the same monitored identity should alert again only if additional PEP source labels appear.

• status toggle: on or off
• Minimum new PEP sources: range 1 to 10

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Reviewing And Confirming Changes

When you click Review changes, Minerva does not save immediately. Instead, it shows a grouped confirmation view that helps you verify what is about to change. The review dialog shows:

• the number of changes and sections affected
• a grouped summary for each rule family
• the current value and the new value side by side
• a short tone label such as Will update, Will enable, or Will disable
• an optional Change Description field

Use the change description to capture the business reason for the update. That description is then available later in configuration history.

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Deployment History And Rollback

The Alert Suppression page includes a quick History drawer so you can preview recent deployments without leaving the configuration page. Use the drawer to:

• see the current live deployment first
• review older deployments as rollback candidates
• preview an older deployment in the current page before committing to it
• jump to the full audit history page

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How Rollback Works

Rollback is a controlled restore flow, not a destructive undo. When you select an older deployment:

1. Minerva previews that historical configuration in the current page
2. the page remains in preview mode until you cancel or continue
3. if you continue, Minerva shows the grouped rollback review before anything is applied
4. when you confirm, Minerva writes a new rollback history entry and makes that restored configuration live

Important behavior:

• rolling back does not delete prior history entries
• the rollback itself becomes part of the audit trail
• Minerva will block a rollback when the selected history entry already matches the current live configuration

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Full Audit History Table

Use the full history page when you need the complete audit record, not just the recent quick-compare list. The table includes:

• Changed: when the configuration was saved or rolled back
• Action: whether the event was an update or a rollback
• Summary: the key rule or preset changes from that deployment
• Changed by: the user who performed the action
• Actions: rollback entry points for older deployments

You can also:

• filter by actor name or email
• filter by All changes, Updates, or Rollbacks
• sort by changed time, action, or actor
• page through the full history set

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Recommended Tuning Approach

If you are configuring alert suppression for the first time:

1. begin by reviewing the existing Balanced baseline, since it is already enabled by default
2. change one rule family at a time so the effect is easier to understand
3. add a clear change description whenever you save
4. use history and rollback if a tuning pass proves too broad or too strict

This usually produces a cleaner operating model than moving directly to the most aggressive settings.

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Related Guides

• Screening Guide
• Profiles
• Bulk Actions Guide