ACCA exposes new findings on an escalating, systemic fraud landscape and calls for a collective reset

19 Nov: According to Combatting fraud in a perfect storm, cyberfraud now dominates both prevalence and materiality globally, amplifying all other risks. Procurement, abuse of authority, and third-party frauds follow close behind as the most prevalent types worldwide. Yet they remain chronically underreported, particularly in SMEs and the public sector.

Drawing on responses from over 2,000 professionals and 31 roundtable discussions around the world, the study – launched during International Fraud Awareness Week – shows how fraud has become industrialised, converging across value and supply chains and outpacing conventional controls.

Md. Sajid Khan, Director – India at ACCA said: ‘Fraud is no longer isolated or opportunistic. AI has accelerated its scale and speed while lagging governance and siloed accountability still allow it to thrive in organisation’s processes and architecture. We need to start asking harder questions: Where are the blind spots? Who owns prevention? And how do we make integrity measurable?’

In collaboration with ACFE, IIA, CISI, ISC2, Airmic and ACi, the report introduces a new Prevalence vs Materiality matrix lens to help organisations make better decisions about allocating resources before fraud diminishes them. Through its companion Calls to Action and Thematic Typology, the report also provides new guidance on assessing what works and doesn’t – and crucially how to incorporate behavioural insights into risk governance, moving fraud prevention from compliance theatre to operational reality.

Key findings:

• Cyberfraud ranks highest for both prevalence and materiality, 39% and 38% respectively, overall, acting as an amplifier for every other form of fraud and interconnecting with harder-to-stop frauds like crypto-linked crimes.
• The survey showed that despite rising prevalence, only 10% of crypto fraud cases are referred to law enforcement – the lowest referral rate of any fraud type.
• Organised crime networks professionalising “fraud-as-a-service": fast-moving, AI-powered and cross-border operations outpacing traditional defences.
• Procurement, abuse of authority and, third-party frauds are silent drains on value, often under-reported like many internal frauds, and misclassified as “operational leakage”.
• Cultural weakness and siloed accountability allow fraud to persist: while 62% of respondents agree that fraud awareness training is important, only 57% believe their organisation proactively looks for fraud and that drops to 51% for accountancy professionals, who emphasised fraud is silently eroding trust and organisational value.
• The survey found that the ease of reporting averaged 70% across fraud types even though fraud risk management maturity and trust in anti-fraud measures varied significantly by region, sector, teams and seniority.

Dr Roger Miles, behavioural scientist and member of ACCA’s special interest group on fraud, added that ACCA’s report is a “wake-up call” no organisations can ignore. ‘The Fear of Finding Out (FOFO) is a major barrier to fraud awareness. We’ve reached a watershed moment where we’ve got to deeply question the truth of the bookkeeping in front of us.’

The report calls for a collective reset, one that embeds proactive detection, strengthens accountability, and builds cultures where raising concerns is safe and expected. It emphasises that combating modern fraud requires uniting disciplines, modernising oversight and making integrity measurable.