Four takeaways from the 2023 Fraud Conference

03 April 2023

The metaverse, the environment, business directors, and more…fraud is everywhere.

At the end of March, professionals and academics from across the UK gathered at the Royal College of Physicians in London to hear insights from experts on key issues in this space, and in this blog, we summarise key themes from the event…

1)      Integrity can be modelled

With COVID lockdown breaches, the war in Ukraine and high-profile cases of fraud from well-known public figures, the conference referenced many moments where we’ve seen a lack of leadership in the past few years.

A lack of leadership, combined often with a lack of integrity from people in positions of power was one of the key themes from the first session of the day, which saw Priya Giuliani use behavioural science to breakdown why people act unethically and discuss some of the tactics we can use to address the integrity deficit.  

A key takeaway from this talk was that most people tend to pick up visual cues over vocal cues, or actions over words, so if a manager acts against the company’s values, this can quickly spread to team members who may see such behaviour as culturally acceptable within an organisation.

By addressing this, along with training and development, investment and innovation, and ethical nudges, positive behaviours can transfer through a team.

2)      Better legislation is needed to tackle fraud more effectively

Fraud is hard to root out – and one reason for this is because of the number of loopholes open for bad actors to take advantage of.

In the second session, speakers on environmental fraud gave an example of just one of these loopholes, where fraudsters collect recycling credits but then dispose of the waste illegally or create complex cycles where material is ‘recycled’ multiple times.

This theme was echoed by the Insolvency Service in a session on Covid fraud and the many examples of directors fraudulently claiming Government support during the pandemic.

And in a talk on the metaverse, speakers discussed the many ways bad actors can take advantage of decentralised online spaces to defraud people out of their money, using the lack of police presence to avoid being caught.

The only way of addressing this is with tougher, tighter legislation – a point we’ve made recently in our work on the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency (ECCT) Bill.

3)       Lack of funding is holding back the fightback

With the scale of fraud in the UK, one issue that was highlighted across many of the sessions was lack of funding.

In a talk from the Insolvency Service and R3’s CEO, Dave Magrath gave some sobering statistics to the amount of time and work that goes into investigating fraud – with 400 staff members in the investigations team looking into around 2,000 investigations a year. Counter that with more than 25,000 cases reported just this year, the issue of money becomes apparent.

Similarly, when tackling fraud in the environmental space prosecutors are underfunded to handle the number of investigations they are facing.

There’s no magic solution, but a well-researched structure to prioritise top cases and more pressure – whether Government pressure in the form of regulation or bottom-up pressure from civil society – all work towards building a more secure society that deters individuals from acting unethically.

4)The Boris Becker trial was a landmark moment for personal insolvency

When Boris Becker entered bankruptcy in 2017, no one knew the legacy that would come from his trial.

After investigations, asset realisation, and a two-week long trial, jurors found Becker guilty of removal of property, two counts of failing to disclose estate and concealing debt.

His conviction and subsequent 2.5-year sentence gave forewarning to anyone facing insolvency about the importance of being open and honest about what assets they have and what they can afford to pay back to creditors.

An ongoing battle

While fraud won’t be solved overnight, the 2023 Fraud Conference highlighted how much work goes into tackling unethical behaviour in all sectors and gave delegates new perspectives on how to build integrity and trust in their own space, whether at home, at work or even in the metaverse.

Thank you to everyone who attended, and to our speakers and sponsors for supporting the event.