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THE REBUILDING OF LOWER MANHATTAN has begun, and between now and 2012, there will be an unprecedented amount of activity. Projects estimated to cost in the range of $13 billion [...]

Weld County, Colorado, District Attorney Ken Buck realized how far his community would go to fight white-collar crime when he heard about a local victim independently tracking a felon who [...]

Working as a lender in a financial institution's private banking operations, which caters to affluent clients, is a plum assignment, bestowing cachet on the person holding that job. But it [...]

Asset misappropriation, corruption and fraudulent statements are the three most common types of fraud committed by employees according to the Assn of Certified Fraud Examiners. Asset misappropriation occurs when employees steal cash or assets from the company. It is the least costly of frauds and cost companies about $65,000 per incident. Corruption cost companies about $400,000 per incident in cases such as purchasing agents who sign contracts for kickbacks. Fraudulent statements involve upper management making illegal statements to lenders, investors and shareholders.

Financial institutions can implement several measures to prevent check frauds. For instance, job applicants' fingerprints should be sent to law enforcement agencies to check out prior felonies. Banks should balance security concerns with the customer service needs of their check cashing policies. Bank tellers should be adequately trained in detecting signs of check fraud. Bank public spaces such as lobbies and check-cashing lines should be monitored by CCTV cameras., Forget the hype about a 'checkless' and 'cashless' society. Debit cards, smart cards, home banking, and the like may one day make checks and currency obsolete, but we're not there [...]

Prompt recognition of the signs of fraud and the formulation of good preventive policies are the key to successfully fighting corporate fraud. Security professionals, however, must ensure that internal controls and procedures that make up proactive policies are properly enforced. These should also be cost-effective and must not interfere with operations. Among these controls are an audit trail, independent checks and balances, segregation of duties, and physical security. Common fraudulent practices, meanwhile, include phony invoicing and shipments to fictitious customers., Security professionals can fight fraud in their companies by learning fraud's symptoms, investigating, and instituting proactive policies. Occupational fraud and abuse drains businesses of an estimated $400 billion per year. [...]

The Assn of Certified Fraud Examiners reveals that in 1996, a total amount of $400 billion was lost by US companies to internal fraud. The number of white collar crimes have climbed and these go undetected by law officials. Crimes classified as white collar include occupational fraud, financial fraud, healthcare fraud, Internet fraud, telemarketing scams and warranty fraud. To prevent these crimes, a number of companies are implementing fraud prevention measures such as regular audits, monitoring of suspicious transactions and imposing communication policies with staff., 'Without some dissimulation no business can be done at all,' wrote the Earl of Chesterfield almost 250 years ago. The Earl is long forgotten, but his business philosophy flourishes among [...]

Handwriting examination is a popular tool used in investigations of various crimes such as fraud and workplace violence. During examination, different aspects of handwriting are considered including the size of letters, distance between words, width of letters as well as the ratio between upper and lower case characters. The examiner also identifies the involuntary patterns of the writing and takes into consideration its fit into the three zones of handwriting., A high-level employee of a Northeast organization almost saw her job search sabotaged in 1997 when several potential employers received a mysterious letter containing slanderous information about her professional abilities [...]

Casinos are highly vulnerable to fraud and cheating given the frenzied gambling environment and the fast exchange of cash and chips. The most common crimes perpetuated against casinos include card marking, 'cooler' scams and slot machine tampering. To curb such crimes, casinos should deploy surveillance personnel and equipment to areas where these crimes occur. In addition, they should train security personnel in identifying potential criminals and criminal activities., A small group of men flew into Las Vegas. Before arriving, they had set up a $100,000 account with a New York City bank, then phoned a large casino on [...]

Marketing gimmicks such as ticketless travel, frequent flyer programs and Internet purchasing have heightened airlines' susceptibility to fraud. Airlines will have to weigh potential costs and customer inconvenience with the adoption of new security solutions. Security professionals are slowly progressing towards the maintenance of such a balance by belding new technology with traditional investigative techniques.

Office supply fraud may be ranked under the category of petty crimes but it can cost a company a substantial amount of money. A surprisingly large number of businesses lose thousands of dollars to unscrupulous suppliers every year and the problem continues to grow. Companies can avoid being victimized by using preventive measures such as educating their employees and tightening purchasing procedures., Office supply scams can cost a company thousands of dollars in overpriced toner, fax paper, and typewriter ribbons, but simple security measures can alert employees and keep hustlers away. A [...]

Tax incentives and cost savings allow US firms to sell their products at much lower prices in overseas markets. Unfortunately, many companies are finding out that products intended for their foreign distributors are being diverted back to the US, thus undercutting their own sales. Moreover, diversion can also cost the company in terms of compromised employee integrity and sales team demoralization. Product diversion can be minimized by implementing strong policies on pricing. In cases where diversion has been detected, the company should immediately take vigorous action against all the entities involved., With product diversion, third parties can undercut a company's price and reap huge profits. When Shulton Inc., maker of Old Spice toiletries, noticed a sharp decline in its domestic sales [...]

Companies may be held liable for fraud perpetrated by their employees under the Federal Sentencing Guidelines for Organizations (FSGO). However, the FSGO may free a company from such liabilities if it deems the company's security programs as adequate. Thus, preventing and detecting fraud is one of the most important functions of security professionals. The different types of fraud, the FSGO's sentencing guidelines, anti-fraud program design, supplemental steps and risk assessment are described.

DOING TIME ON THE TELEPHONE LINE WHEN 13 PERSONS PLEADED guilty or were convicted last fall of marketing 1,500 stolen long-distance access codes, the estimated loss to the five victimized [...]

The poor management of fraud prevention programs in corporations is one of the reasons why the problem is still rampant. Many companies have not developed antifraud strategies and have not created a team that will focus on overseeing countermeasures to prevent theft of information, money and even goods. Another factor that hampers the success of fraud prevention is the lack of knowledge of the people involved in the development of countermeasures to determine ways of making fraud difficult to practice., Fraud prevention programs are often fractured among departments, making life easy for unscrupulous employees. Most companies have a strong program of countermeasures to prevent theft and the more overt forms [...]

Industries with quality products and services are subject to fraud such as product diversion or transshipping where a product is distributed to unauthorized retailers who sell the good at a reduced price. The company's bottom line is affected for it competes with its own product line. It also affects consumer confidence. Authorized dealers lose business to these fraudulent organizations. While export products are the target of diversion, products for domestic markets are not spared. Diverters of products can be the company's sales staff, phony retailers, exporters and factories., The XYZ Corporation - which manufactures small porcelain figurines that sell for $75 to $100 each in stores throughout the United States and Europe - receives an order from a [...]

Security departments should develop robust fraud prevention strategies. They should also stop relying solely on the criminal courts when handling fraud cases and instead use the civil courts to either force perpetrators to stop their illegal activities or burden them with severe financial hardship. A particularly favorite venue of perpetrators of fraud is telemarketing., An elderly woman receives a promotional flyer in the mail from what appears to be a well-known local bank offering low-interest credit cards. Seeing an opportunity to save money on [...]

Cellular telephone toll fraud and cellular telephone subscriber fraud are growing concerns in the US. Stolen cellular phones cause losses to customers amounting to hundreds of millions of dollars every year. In cellular telephone subscriber fraud, criminals committing serious crimes such as smuggling and drug trafficking default on their payments to cellular communications carriers, and avoid leaving a paper trail. Some criminals can also determine the electronic identities of cellular users using simple electronic gadgets. Various ways of guarding against cellular telephone fraud are discussed.

The trend of user-owned telecommunications systems following deregulation and divestiture is plagued with the growing incidence of toll fraud. It is estimated that in 1993, 35,000 users will become victims of toll fraud, which is the theft of long-distance services by highly sophisticated electronic hackers and professional thieves. In 1992, users lost an estimated $2.5 billion in long distance charges from unauthorized calls made through their equipment. Some steps on how to manage telecommunications equipment to prevent toll fraud are presented., TOLL FRAUD HAS BECOME THE modern scourge of user-owned telecommunications systems, reaching epidemic proportions in early 1993. Estimates from my own company, Telecommunications Advisors, Inc. (TAI), are that more than [...]

A 'bad boy' database, regular e-mails about Internet scams, and a fraud museum are some of the resources available to merchants who belong to Card Caps, a business-to-business consortium with [...]

A survey of fraud-control arrangements in Australian government agencies indicates that the most frequent internal fraud is inappropriate use of petty cash and other negotiable instruments, such as checks. In [...]

The Worldwide E-Commerce Fraud Prevention Network, a merchant-based coalition of more than 350 companies working to reduce online fraud, has launched a Web site to provide fraudfighting advice and information. [...]

You've just gotten the satisfaction of posting the winning bid in an online auction, and after mailing your check, you eagerly await your item. But it never comes, or something [...]

Current law does an 'adequate' job of covering most crimes committed on the Internet, but other laws may need to be created or amended to more thoroughly address the evolving [...]

It never fails. Emptying your pockets after a vacation or business trip, you fish out the hotel key you've forgotten to return. In fact, hotel key cards are unwittingly taken [...]

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 mandates greater oversight on the governance of publicly-traded companies. Under the law, public firms are required to establish whistleblower programs. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., on the other hand, has issued guidelines on the implementation of fraud hotlines for financial institutions.

www.securitymanagement.com Timely security information is more important than ever. And that makes it more important than ever to use Security Management Online, which has breaking news plus in-depth analysis from [...]

Statistics show that fraud on the Internet is on the rise. According to the National Consumers League, complaints arising from Internet-related fraud had increased 600% in 1998, while the Securities and Exchange Commission cited the growing number of enforcement proceedings against companies and individuals accused of deception through the Internet. Security professionals are advised to consider a broad range of issues before using the Web as an information tool.

AirTouch Cellular has adopted several countermeasures designed to combat cellular telephone fraud. These include the tightening up of sign-up procedures to prevent the creation of fraudulent accounts in the future and the installation of software to identify existing subscriber fraud. The Pen-Link 6.0 is an automated case management software is a tool that can be used to analyze call patterns that may indicate fraudulent accounts., The countermeasures used by AirTouch Cellular to combat cellular fraud, such as cloning, are pretty effective, says Charles Smith, manager of special activities for the company's eastern division fraud department. [...]

Companies can avoid pension fraud by conducting an investigation on the background of people or companies they are dealing with. They should search public records for relevant information regarding these people, since the activities of criminals who engage in fraud are often preserved in these documents. Important data can be gleaned from corporate records, data about liens or judgments filed by regulatory agencies against the company in question, records of civil lawsuits, bankruptcy databases and other on-line computer services., AN EXAMINER WITH THE PENsion Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC), the federal agency that protects the pension funds of nearly 41 million American workers, made a startling discovery while examining several [...]

Tumbling, cloning and roaming are different types of cellular telephone fraud, which causes losses estimated at one million dollars a day. The operation of cellular telephones using the electronic serial number and the mobile identification number is described to show how criminalas are able to carry out telephone fraud. Tips to help companies detect cellular telephone fraud are presented.

A skilled security manager can prevent corporate fraud. Most cases of corporate fraud are committed by employees in connivance with other employees or with another company. However, many companies opt to conceal such actions due to fears of damaging their images as well as employee morale, avoidance of union problems and also lack of confidence in the judicial system. Still, corporate fraud can be prevented through the frequent checking and effective supervision of accounting, financial and operational controls. Clear honesty and integrity policies coupled with the certainty of criminal prosecution for offenders also contribute to effective fraud prevention programs., COMPANIES ARE DEFRAUDED IN many ways and for many reasons by employees at every level. No industry is immune, but a security manager skilled in identifying and investigating fraud can [...]

Is your company experiencing financial losses because of unsolicited telephone sales pitches? Most unsolicited calls are from legitimate sources, but many deal in fraudulent or gray areas of the law [...]

Data from the European ATM Security show that ATM fraud has increased by 149% in 2008, due mostly to the rise in card skimming schemes. Europe has introduced the European Mastercard Visa (EMV) smart cards, which has embedded microchips to avoid counterfeits. Details on ATM fraud schemes and how to avoid them are presented.

AlpVision SA and SGS Societe Generale de Surveillance SA are jointly launching a program to fight fraud, forgery, and counterfeiting of government and commercial sensitive [...]

A new service that detects and flags potentially fraudulent college degrees from diploma mills is now available from Truescreen of Southampton, Pennsylvania. DegreeScan compares the names of educational institutions with [...]

Season ticket holders at Germany's Hanover Zoo are now verified through a facial recognition system to prevent fraudulent use of Zoo-Card passes. The holder's face is compared to the reference [...]

A polite message from a stranger in Nigeria arrives via e-mail, offering a huge reward for help with smuggling money out of the country. Those foolish enough to go along [...]

School security. A bill (HR. 2752) introduced by Rep. Mike Ferguson (RNJ) would establish specific criminal penalties for fraud relating to unauthorized access to information on the Web sites of [...]