Based on interviews with 5,400+ companies in 40+ countries, PricewaterhouseCoopers Global Economic Crime Survey is the largest, most comprehensive international survey of economic crime worldwide.
According to this year’s survey report, over 30 percent of respondents reported suffering one or more significant economic crimes during the past 12 months. The global recession was cited for heightened risk of fraud by 40 percent of all respondents who said that their organization faced greater risk of economic crime in the downturn. Â Many respondents identified underlying business pressures related to the downturn as the motivation for rising fraud, citing difficulty in achieving business targets and fear of losing jobs.
The 5th biennial global economic crime survey is based on months of interviews, from July to November 2009.
Highlights of the survey indicate that despite the attention of regulators and companies’ investment in controls, fraud remains one of the most problematic issues for companies around the world. The actual level of economic crime and associated financial and non-financial losses has not decreased. Nearly one of two companies fell victim to economic crime in the last two years. The report finds that economic crime is intractable because of the many kinds of fraud and the broad range of employees, including senior executives, who commit them. It concludes that companies cannot rely on fraud controls alone to detect and deter economic crime. Companies need to build loyalty to the organization, give employees the confidence to do the right thing, and put in place clear sanctions for those who commit fraud, regardless of their position in the company.
See the numbers, view all country reports at: http://www.pwc.com
Occupational fraud, the survey concludes, “occurs during both economic booms and busts; [but] . . . is more likely to be detected when prosperity withers and uncertainty thrives.â€
