The level of fraud in the UK has reached record breakingproportions with the number of cases coming to court topping levels not seenover the last 20 years.
According to the KPMG Forensic Fraud Barometer the lastdecade saw a significant shift upwards in the level of criminal activity with£7bn of fraud and 1,750 cases in the 2000s compared to £5bn and 700 cases inthe 1990s.
One of the problems last year was a higher than usual levelof management fraud with £335m of cases coming to court and employees did theirfair share of harm racking up £232m.
Computerisation has made fraud easier and that trend isexpected to continue said Hitesh Patel, partner at KPMG Forensic.
“Britain appears to have a rising fraud problem, as isevident by looking at the steady increase through the last ten years,” Pateladded “The credit crunch will undoubtedly make the situation worse, and we areyet to see the full impact of it.”
“The comfort, if there is any, is that more fraud cases aresuccessfully being brought to court.”
One example of the industry using their skills forfraudulent ways came in the case of a Scottish IT professional who printed£185,000 of his own fake banknotes to fund a business venture. His reward was afive year stretch.
KPMG has also sent out an early warning around the potentialfor fraud connected with the 2012 Olympics.
Record fraud in 2009 closes out the 'naughty Noughties' - KPMG Fraud Barometer
Fraud by victim (Jan-Dec 2009)
Victim Total (£) Number of cases
Government 476,210,298 59
Investor 339,281,908 27
Financial Institutions 396,352,550 79
Commercial Business 58,425,163 59
Other 44,156,217 47
Total 1,314,426,135 271
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