White-collar crime - an ever-growing blight inflecting the global economy

White-collar crime is flourishing worldwide and causes global damages in the billions. The number of unreported cases is even higher. Law enforcement alone cannot stem the growing problem. Companies are therefore required to protect themselves by internal audits, investigations and prevention of white-collar crime.

There are no simple or standard solutions for such a complex problem as white-collar crime. Public authorities, politicians and the economic system must all contribute to the according measures. Studies demonstrate that large companies are nowadays dealing with this specific threat and the measures against criminal activities have increased in the recent years (PwC 2009). This commitment has proven effective, as economic damages can thus be stopped or avoided.

Cross-references between information

At first glance, white-collar crimes can appear to be regular business transactions. Criminals develop complex methods to maintain this first impression. Gaining reliable findings on crime patterns and potential perpetrators circles is complicated. In most cases complex information structures from different sources should be merged.

In such cases an analytical approach is needed, otherwise fraud investigations are often doomed to failure. Analytical investigations are helpful in fraud crimes as most companies are often affected by property crimes, such as fraud and embezzlement as well as competition offenses (brand and product piracy)- see PwC 2009 S. 3 et seq.).