By C.M. Matthews
About one in 10 companies said they were affected by corruption and bribery in 2012, a significant decline from 2011, according to a new survey.
The survey, released Tuesday by Kroll Advisory Solutions, found that 11% of companies reported they were affected by bribery and corruption over the last year, down from 19% in 2011. The decrease comported with the study’s overall finding: A drop to 63% from 80% in the proportion of companies saying their exposure to fraud, in general, had increased in the last year.
For the sixth annual iteration of Global Fraud Survey, Kroll polled more than 830 senior executives at international companies from a range of industries. The respondents were polled in July and August.
In addition to the perceived effects of fraud, companies’ sense of vulnerability also seemed to decrease, Kroll found. According to the the survey, 24% of those polled felt their company was vulnerable to corruption or bribery, down from 47%. The percentages decreased nearly across the board for a range of other frauds as well — regulatory or compliance breach vulnerability dipped to 28% from 41%, money laundering vulnerability to 13% from 25% and internal financial fraud to 26% from 38%.
Kroll said that increased anti-corruption compliance controls appeared to have decreased companies’ exposure to corruption. According to the survey, 52% of companies had done a corruption risk assessment and instituted controls, up from 24% in 2011, and 55% said they had trained employees and vendors on the U.K. Bribery Act and the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, up from 29%.
This article was written by C.M. Matthews and originally published on blogs.wsj
