Latest Articles
Speaking out when it matters
Speaking up at work can be very difficult, even if you know it’s the right thing to do. You see something unethical. Notice someone being …
FraudCracker interviewed by Safety Detective
Aviva Zacks of Safety Detective recently interviewed Colette Symanowitz of FraudCracker, to find out how our ground-breaking tech helps peo…
Today is #GlobalEthicsDay2020
Today 21st October 2020 is Global Ethics Day. This is a fantastic teaching opportunity for organisations worldwide to share the vital role …
FraudCracker among global top 100 cybersecurity startups for 2020
Great news! Cyber Defense Magazine has released the names of the Top 100 Cybersecurity Startups worldwide for 2020, and FraudCracker has ma…
U.S. court grants IDC access to Gupta financial records from 17 global banks
Remember that saying “The wheels of justice turn slowly but they grind exceedingly fine”? It’s finally come true for the Guptas. Proof t…
Bosses demand women ‘dress sexier’ for video calls
As working remotely becomes the norm, we’re seeing an alarming pattern emerging among sexist leadership teams. Bosses have been oversteppin…
Stop asking job seekers about prior pay
Sadly, even today, equal pay for equal work is still not a reality. According to 2016 U.S. Census data, women earn 80 cents compared to eve…
Corruption: can we beat the gravy train? Webinar
Corruption is a massive problem worldwide with deep social, political and economic costs. But it isn’t unbeatable. We can beat corruption, …
5 government officials arrested in fraud case linked to Vrede dairy farm and Department of Agriculture
In South Africa, the fight against corruption is finally leading to arrests. On 17-Aug-2020, the Hawk’s Serious Corruption Investigation …
Will we see more women leaders because of the pandemic?
From New Zealand to Germany, from Iceland to Taiwan, women are setting the global bar on how to lead effectively in a crisis. According to …
FraudCracker gets certification from The Ethics Institute
It’s official! We now have certification from The Ethics Institute (TEI) for FraudCracker, our online fraud reporting tool with interactive…
Mashaba’s People’s Dialogue party to hit corruption hard
The party created by former Johannesburg Mayor, Herman Mashaba, The People’s Dialogue, has corruption-busting at the top of its agenda. A…
South Africa joins outcry against U.S. exec order targeting ICC staff
On Thursday 11 June 2020 Donald Trump signed an exec order authorising travel restrictions and sanctions against International Criminal Cou…
South Africa’s rhino dehorning project tackles poaching
South Africa has dehorned dozens of rhinos in 3 game parks. Hopefully, this decisive action will stop poachers taking advantage of the COVI…
ACFE webinar: Protecting whistleblowers in the digital age
Thanks to all of you who attended our webinar for ACFESA (the Association of Fraud Examiners South Africa) that Colette presented on 4-June…
On CoronaCracker site, you can report violations of coronavirus regulations
Good news: our CoronaCracker website is now up and running at http://www.coronacracker.co.za/. This enables you to anonymously report viola…
Rather than blaming people for starting the corona outbreak, let’s work together to end it
Worldwide, Asian people are facing increased discrimination, as many blame China for the coronavirus outbreak. Globally, we’re seeing spike…
The US businessman who made life hard for the Guptas
US businessman Bill Browder was Russia’s biggest foreign investor – until he took on the corruption endemic to the system. However, when he…
Can you spot the potential embezzler in your company?
Which of your employees is most likely to steal the big bucks from your company? Here’s where the Marquet Report on Embezzlement is especia…
Gambling with lives: Government not protecting corruption whistle-blowers
South Africa’s Minister of Police Bheki Cele is not carrying out his constitutional responsibility to ‘prevent, combat… crime [and] to …
NDAs ‘should not silence sexual harassment claims’
Ex-movie mogul Harvey Weinstein and his company used non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) to silence accusations of his sexual misbehaviour. Bu…
Don’t punish employees who raise problems
Divergent, dissenting voices are vital for growth and innovation. But some leaders penalise employees who raise problems, afraid of what th…
Is the WHO division tackling the coronavirus corrupt and underfunded?
The WHO Health Emergencies Program, the division spearheading the worldwide response to the coronavirus outbreak, is severely underfunded, …
South Africa now has vital laws for sex offences courts
South African laws and regulations outlining the standards for sex offences courts were published on 7 Feb 2020 and implemented on 31 Jan 2…
Fraud reporting tools: Does my company need one? Do they work?
Does my company need a tool for employees to report fraud, and do these work? Definitely yes. Read this article to find out why.
First, …
Did corruption trigger the coronavirus outbreak?
The latest lethal strain of coronavirus arose at a wild animal meat market in Wuhan, China. This is according to the Chinese Center for Dis…
Is your company at risk? Tips to prevent business fraud
Employee fraud is much more common than you think. It could be happening to you, and you may not even know it. So what can you do to preven…
Critical success factor #1 for anti-fraud tools: Anonymity
When designing FraudCracker, a ground-breaking online fraud reporting solution for companies, our founder Dr Gavin Symanowitz identified no…
Confidence fraud: how to avoid being scammed
Confidence fraud, also called romance scamming, is on the rise. But the FBI is coming down hard on perpetrators. Get tips from the FBI on h…
Africa’s richest woman accused of fraud and corruption
Prosecutors in Angola are accusing Africa’s richest woman, Isabel dos Santos, of embezzlement and money laundering. Attorney General Helder…
Will Ukraine’s new whistle-blower law punish innocent businesses?
October 2019 saw Ukraine’s Parliament introduce the “Whistle-blowers Law”. This gives far-reaching protection to people who blow the lid …
Every one of us can do something about corruption
Corruption hurts all of us. And we can all benefit from standing United Against Corruption. Most of us think that corruption is “just a wa…
Today is global anti-corruption day. So what will you do differently?
Today 9-December is International Anti-Corruption Day. Corruption hurts all of us. At an individual level, it increases the amount of tax p…
Eskom to lifestyle-audit 2,300 more staff as it turns up the heat against corruption
Great to see South Africa’s electricity supplier Eskom picking up the fight against corruption in the organisation. After lifestyle-auditin…
South African State charges EFF leaders Julius Malema and Floyd Shivambu
It’s great to see heads finally starting to roll in the fight against injustice and corruption in South Africa. The EFF have been hit with …
The cryptoqueen: the hunt for a multi-billion-dollar scam artist
They called her the cryptoqueen. Bulgarian-born fraudster Dr Ruja Ignatova was a jet-setting, Oxford-educated entrepreneur with her own uni…
ANC MP Bongani Bongo arrested for corruption
It’s taken a long time, but corrupt politicians involved in South Africa’s state capture are finally getting punished. The Hawks’ Serious C…
SARS fires legal head over R420m Gupta VAT refund
Walls are shrinking for the corrupt Gupta clan. SARS head of legal, Refiloe Mokoena, has been fired. Mokoena allegedly granted the Gupta fa…
Lord Peter Hain puts foreign governments, global firms front and centre in South Africa’s State Capture
The Guptas wouldn’t have been able to capture South Africa without the help of a global network of consultants, lawyers, accountants and ba…
Facebook deletes 3.2bn fake accounts and millions of child abuse posts
Facebook Inc took down 3.2bn fake accounts in Q3 and Q4/2019, plus millions of posts showing child abuse and suicide. This is according to …
Facebook and YouTube block spread of whistleblower’s name and photo. Twitter allows both.
Facebook and Youtube are taking a stand. They’re blocking users from sharing the identity of a CIA officer who allegedly filed the damning …
Strong leadership and punishment of corruption wrongdoers: steps to rebuilding confidence in South Africa
The Springboks’ decisive win in the Rugby World Cup has boosted every South African’s spirits (thank you Bokke, we needed this!). However, …
Is there a place for humans in digitally disrupted accounting?
Cloud computing, automation, Artificial Intelligence, the Internet of Things and blockchain. More and more, integration of financial data, …
Mattel’s CFO to leave after audit mistakes uncovered
Mattel’s chief financial officer is leaving the US toy firm after a board investigation triggered by a whistleblower report exposed mista…
We’re just too scared to report wrongdoing
The number of us who’ve seen wrongdoing is rising, studies have found – but many of us are too scared to report it. In 2018 in South Afr…
South Africa’s anti-money laundering measures under global spotlight
The Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the inter-governmental regulating body, are in South Africa to evaluate the country’s compliance …
EOH blacklists 50 business partners in corruption crackdown
JSE-listed tech group EOH is cracking down on corruption in a big way. EOH has blacklisted 50 enterprise development partners, and reported…
White House protects whistleblowers better than companies do
It looks like the White House’s system protects whistleblowers better than companies’ hotlines do. Harvard Business School professor Eu…
Successfully navigating the post #MeToo workplace
On the surface, it looks like women are making progress toward equality in the post #MeToo era. In politics, women are making headway. We s…
Medical regulator suspends 5 execs for alleged corruption
South Africa’s CMS (Council for Medical Schemes) recently announced the suspension of 5 senior officials, following allegations of corrupti…
EOH files criminal charges against corrupt employees
Under-fire tech services company EOH will lay criminal charges against employees involved in corruption. In a statement issued on 10-Oct-20…
U.S. sanction law targets Gupta network
It’s been a great week for the fight against corruption. The Gupta network of shady deals has been dealt a big blow, with the U.S. governme…
Drexel University professor spent federal grants at strip clubs
A former Drexel University professor allegedly spent almost $200,000 of federal research money on strip clubs and other personal expenses, …
8 things leaders do that make employees quit
You can’t control every aspect of your team’s work experience. If someone wants to leave badly enough, then they will. That said, there a…
20% of Big 4-audited IPO’s report weaknesses in financial-reporting controls
Lose Control Spin Out GIF from Losecontrol GIFs
Going public with serious holes in controls is more common than you think. In MarketWat…
Google can forget you – but only in Europe
If you want your past to be forgotten on the Net, moving to Europe might be your best bet. Google won’t have to apply Europe’s “right t…
British government still aiding repression in human rights-abusing countries
The British government continues to approve the export of hi-tech surveillance equipment and software of the type that is being used by sta…
Protecting whistle-blowers in the digital age
Speaking at the #ACFESA Africa conference this week on protecting whistle-blowers in the digital age. Lots of interesting other talks. Grea…
Call for forensic investigation into farmworker equity schemes
When Jolande Smith and 240 other farmworkers became shareholders in the Langwyde Werknemers Trust 10 years ago, they were led to believe th…
Garmin SA shopping website hacked
Garmin South Africa’s shop[dot]garmin[dot]co[dot]za website was hacked. This was according to an email sent out on 12-Sep-2019 by Garmin SA…
VP steals $5.4m from Goldman Sachs to pay gambling debt
Online poker was the undoing of Ashwani Jhunjhunwala, Goldman Sachs’ VP in India. Police have arrested him for stealing Rs 38 crore ($5.4m)…
VBS theft, money laundering & life’s little luxuries: Julius Malema’s time of spending dangerously
The lifestyle and political aspirations of EFF president Julius Malema were also funded from the R16m robbed from VBS Mutual Bank. Scorpioâ…
Inside entrepreneurs’ IP theft fight with Nedbank
“Unethical” is the way that entrepreneur, Thandile Jwambi, described Nedbank’s behaviour in the IP theft case he and his partner, Nicolas K…
Regiments Capital ‘stole’ R349m from pensioners in 4 days
Regiments Capital has agreed to an astounding R500m settlement with the Transnet Second Defined Benefit Fund (TSDBF). Regiments, a financia…
Does doing the same work over and over again make you less ethical?
Managers worry about employees breaking the rules. And they’re right to be concerned. Research shows that working on the same task can lead…
How Axiata uses data analytics to thwart telecom fraud
Telecom fraud is rapidly becoming one of the biggest sources of revenue loss for telco providers everywhere. A low-risk alternative to trad…
How Uber uses psychological tricks to push its drivers’ buttons
Uber carried out an eye-opening experiment in behavioural science to subtly entice its independent workforce of drivers to maximise its gro…
Make your meetings a safe space for honest conversation
To have better meetings means leading with mutual respectful, inclusivity, and creating a space safe enough for your people to speak their …
When fraud meets advanced tech
For years, auditors have focused on internal controls to assess if the control environment works effectively to reduce the risk of fraud. A…
Whistle-blowers are a sign of healthy companies
More whistles blown are a sign of health, not sickness. Firms whose hotlines get used more, tend to be more profitable and have less legal …
Social media: a rising threat to journalists’ freedom
Social media has made democracies more democratic by giving everyone a voice. But it also makes cyberbullies with large followings dangerou…
Whistleblowers need our trust and our protection
Fraud researcher and documentary filmmaker Kelly Richmond Pope shares lessons from some of the most high-profile whistle-blowers of the pas…
Thank you to all the whistleblowers out there
Yesterday 30-July was #WhistleblowerAppreciationDay in the US, while 23-June was World Whistleblower Day. It’s our way of saying a big th…
Ghost workers could kill your company
Are you paying salaries to people who don’t work for you, or who don’t exist? Ghost worker fraud on a company’s payroll is one of the har…
Facebook slapped with record $5bn fine over privacy breaches
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has slapped tech giant Facebook with a record $5bn fine over privacy breaches. A US government agency, t…
Ethical leadership means first do no harm, in business and in life
We need to be the change we want to see, we can’t expect others to do the right thing when we continue to do wrong. When balancing the d…
A R1.2bn pot of toxic soup at EOH
Eight people. That’s all. Eight people out of EOH’s staff of 11,500 put the entire company in jeopardy through a systematic process of …
Forensic probe uncovers R1.2bn in suspicious transactions at EOH
According to an update today, law firm ENSafrica found evidence of and is investigating R1.2bn in suspicious transactions at ICT group EOH….
The neuroscience of trust
Creating a culture of trust is good for business. Employees in high-trust organisations are more productive and engaged, have more energy a…
4 Ways Lying Becomes the Norm at a Company
Many recent corporate scandals such as Volkswagen or Wells Fargo have been cases of wide-scale dishonesty. But how could lying and deceit h…
Medical aid schemes caught in a vice between fraud and claims of racial profiling
Fraud against medical aid schemes is a big problem worldwide. But in South Africa, there is another aspect to the issue. And that is race. …
The 3 elements of trust
People are more likely to trust leaders who understand and embody the 3 elements that underlie trust. These are:
Positive relationships…
Are you ready to fight fraud?
Strengthening the internal control system and the control environment will help reduce the likelihood of fraud happening as well as the imp…
This is a WhatsApp whistleblowing message. I don’t know how else to do it
In 2016, out of desperation while on a pilgrimage in France, former South African Airways (SAA) treasurer Cynthia Stimpel sent a WhatsApp m…
KPMG fallout: cheating allegations raise new questions
After new allegations at KPMG of cheating on internal training tests, audit committees now have questions about their external auditors’ ow…
Managers aren’t doing enough to encourage whistle-blowing
If something was seriously wrong at your company, would your staff tell you? The article prompts managers to ask themselves some hard quest…
Record number of CEOs fired for ethical lapses
A record 18% of CEOs were replaced in 2018, with more top execs forced out for ethical lapses than were fired for poor performance or disag…
10 tips to avoid common financial scams
Data breaches, identity theft, online scams – every year, a destructive flood of fraud sweeps the world, leaving countless victims in its w…
Create a workplace where everyone feels comfortable speaking up
It’s vital for employees to voice their concerns when they see something worrying or unethical. But how do you make everyone understand t…
Why is whistle-blowing important?
Whistle-blowing is the most effective way of exposing wrongdoing. In 2 scientific studies (ACFE and PWC), whistle-blowers uncovered over 40…
Fraud causes financial loss in almost half of firms
Occupational fraud and abuse are causing financial losses in almost half of all firms, a survey from Mazars finds. The average loss per com…
Bullying and sexual harassment rife in the legal field
Bullying and sexual harassment are rampant in the legal profession. This is according to a new study on nearly 7,000 legal professionals in…
Can we ever get rid of corruption worldwide?
Ask citizens why their countries aren’t developing, ask investors why they choose not to invest in some regions, and corruption is almost…
The psychology behind unethical behaviour
Three psychological dynamics lead to crossing ethical lines: omnipotence, cultural numbness and justified neglect. These come into play whe…
If your company is going through a public scandal should you leave?
If you’re working at a Gupta-tainted company like KPMG, and they’re going through a public scandal, here’s the big question: should you sti…
Theranos whistleblower Erika Cheung on what went wrong and what’s next
Many people were involved in the spectacular downfall of once-buzzy Silicon Valley blood testing wunderkind, Theranos. But perhaps one of t…
Sterling’s dark, dirty secret: a culture of sexual harassment and unequal pay for women
While the #MeToo Movement shone a global spotlight on the entertainment industry, it’s painfully clear that the problem is just as wides…
P&G puts ad platforms like Facebook, Google on notice for fraud, harmful content, etc.
Procter & Gamble Co., one of the most important advertisers for Google and Facebook, ramped up criticism of internet platforms, saying …
Are patents worth it? Lessons from the $9bn Theranos fraud
The world is buzzing about Elizabeth Holmes. Her $9bn+ biotech company Theranos promised low-cost tech able to detect health ailments with …
Protect yourself against white-collar crime
Thanks to research from GIBS (the Gordon Institute of Business Science, South Africa), companies can use the insights of convicted white-co…
Check out our new EthicsDefender video!
Our new EthicsDefender video is live. Take a look and let us know what you think!
P.S. Big shout-out to our voice-over and video…
Today is World Voice Day
Today 16th April is World Voice Day. Your voice matters! This is your day to make your voice heard, to not keep quiet about fraud and wrong…
Telling the truth: dangerous but vital
Looking at the recent protests in South Africa around the launch of Pieter-Louis Myburgh’s book Gangster State, one thing is clear: tellin…
Assange arrested after Ecuador withdraws asylum protection
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was expelled from his hideout in Ecuador’s embassy in London today and quickly arrested by London police…
Why open secrets exist in organisations
In 2017, the New York Times broke the now widely-known scandal of media mogul Harvey Weinstein’s apparent decades-long pattern of sexual …