The changing face of fraud: A PwC forensic outlook

As technologies and devices continue to evolve, it is interesting to note that the nature and sophistication of frauds and everyday risks that people face have also changed significantly, with time. With the proliferation of data and new ways of inter-connectivity, today fraudsters are continuously devising new ways of cheating people and conducting underhand activities.

In old days, people feared robberies, kidnapping, extortion and other traditional forms of crime such as petty theft and burglaries. Today, they need to be aware and worried about getting impersonated, becoming victims of phoney internet sellers and mass marketing scams, ransomware attacks, debit card skimming, ATM frauds, computer viruses and other forms of the hydra-headed problem of fraud.

• How many of you pause and think before clicking on a link in an email from an unknown sender about freebies and gifts? 
• How many times have you left your debit/credit card pin written on an unattended note? 
• Have you engaged with a telemarketer offering you a big prize in a lottery and asking you to deposit some token money in an account?
• When was the last time you changed your email password?

Frauds not only hit individuals but also have a very detrimental impact on corporates. The stakeholders (management, employees, customers, vendors, etc.) in a corporate could also be susceptible to a wide variety of frauds depending on the sector (financial services, IT, telecom, FMCG, pharma, etc.) in which it operates. 

An overview of new age frauds in corporates

In contrast to the past, when a majority of corporate frauds were related to accounting or asset misappropriation, today, we see a wide range of frauds emerging across sectors.