Prevention is better than cure – managing fraud risk effectively

Now more than ever, it is essential for Irish businesses and the State to take a proactive, robust approach to preventing, detecting and investigating fraud.

It is estimated that the public, private and not-for-profit sectors in Ireland lose €3.5bn each year to fraud and cybercrime. An Garda Síochána has highlighted the significant risks posed by:

• “Invoice redirection fraud”, where criminals dupe accounting staff into changing the bank details they hold for established suppliers, in order to redirect legitimate payments for goods and services
• “CEO fraud”, where fraudsters impersonate senior personnel and mislead junior staff into making substantial, urgent payments to a specified bank account, which the criminals control
• “Phishing fraud” committed by email, where the unknown installation of malware onto computer systems allows fraudsters to track their targets’ online activity or gain access to sensitive financial or commercial information

In Ireland, Crowe is working across the public, private and not-for-profit sectors to help clients strengthen their stances against fraud. Our approach includes assisting with three key defence pillars:

• Setting the ‘tone from the top’: Boards should establish and communicate clear policies to specify that:
  • Fraud, bribery and corrupt practices will not be tolerated
  • There is organisation-wide commitment to preventing and detecting fraud
  • Breaches of the fraud policy will result in prosecution of offenders
• Managing fraud risk effectively: Organisations should develop and document a Fraud Risk Management Strategy, setting out the measures in place to reduce the likelihood and impact of fraud. This should cover both detecting corrupt practices and deterring fraud attempts
• Responding to fraud robustly: Organisations should prepare a Fraud Response Plan, clearly explaining the actions to be taken if fraud or corruption are reported or detected

Globally, Crowe has developed market-leading expertise in fraud advisory services. From our unique credentials and extensive thought-leadership research, we have developed a range of cutting-edge tools to help our clients assess:

• The potential scale of their losses from fraud
• The actions most effective in reducing fraud-related losses
• The likely costs of putting appropriate countermeasures in place

For further information on working with the Crowe team in Ireland to reduce your risk of fraud, contact a member of our internal audit and risk team.