Global

Blind faith

ACFE President and CEO Bruce Dorris, J.D., CFE, CPA, reflects on the lack of oversight and controls that led to the fall of FTX and the importance for CFEs to prevent and detect fraud in the growing cryptocurrency market.

Two members join ACFE Board of Regents for 2023-2024

CFEs elected two new members to ACFE’s Board of Regents for the 2023-2024 term. The new members, Thomas A. Caulfield, CFE, and Natalie S. Lewis, CFE, replaced outgoing Regents Hannibal “Mike” Ware, CFE, and Alexandra Sagaro, CFE, whose terms ended in 2023. Caulfield and Lewis took their oaths of office during the board’s meeting in February.

Food fraud and more

Fraudsters are using dilutions, substitution, counterfeits and mislabeling to infiltrate the global food market; a software engineer in Washington steals from his employer in a scheme inspired by the comedy movie "Office Space"; executives in South Korea are convicted in a $1.5 billion V Global scam.

Discount fraud

Sales of “gray market” products generally are viewed as legal, but diversion of deeply discounted products from authorized distribution networks is often based upon fraud. Here we examine schemes to illicitly obtain millions of dollars of discounts through this pervasive but relatively unknown type of fraud. And we offer ways to ward off fraudsters’ efforts.

Fraud in reconstruction: What awaits Ukraine?

When countries devastated by war, natural disasters or other calamities must rebuild, valiant efforts to rise from the rubble must be paired with another intangible quality: integrity. But prior experience with hastened economic relief underscores the need to couple that relief with a fortifying effort to deter corruption.

Sleuths on the cyber trail

Andy Greenberg, the award-winning WIRED reporter, talks about his latest book on bitcoin tracing and how law enforcement still has the upper hand in its fight against cyberfraudsters and other criminals on the dark web.

Taming fraud in crypto’s Wild West

The meteoric rise and sudden downfall of crypto exchange FTX, and its founder Sam Bankman-Fried, is likely to become an essential case study for fraud examiners seeking to understand the new Wild West of the financial markets. Here we look at what happened and lessons learned from possibly one of the largest U.S. financial frauds.

CFEs have the edge in pay, high work satisfaction, 2022 Compensation Guide shows

Certified Fraud Examiners (CFEs) earn 17% more than their non-certified counterparts, and 62% report being happy on the job. These are just a few of the insights from the Association of Certified Fraud Examiner’s (ACFE) 2022 Compensation Guide for Anti-Fraud Professionals, which also revealed a slow trend toward gender diversity in the anti-fraud profession and changing workplace habits since the COVID-19 pandemic.

A house of cards and more

In the U.K., a man is arrested for attempting to sell a house he was renting; tech workers in Southeast Asia are conned into working for cybercrime rings; a 58-year-old woman receives a prison sentence for heading one of the biggest marriage fraud conspiracies in U.S. history.

5 most scandalous fraud cases of 2022

Each year the ACFE, along with input from our Advisory Council, selects the five most scandalous fraud stories of the year based on money lost, lives impacted and relevance to the anti-fraud profession. It’s another year, and we have a brand-new list.

Battling fraudulent product substitution

Fraud fighters have long been aware of the dangers of product substitution and counterfeit parts in military equipment. But global supply chain shortages and the U.S. armed forces’ need for obsolete parts have exacerbated the problem. Here a former NCIS agent talks about his experience and how a more proactive approach can help.

Thwart procurement fraud

Organizations need to buy goods and services. Fraudsters love to target faulty procurement systems because that’s where they can find fantastic amounts of cash. But you can impede integrity breaches with dynamic data analytics.