Fighting Fraud Requires Anticipatory Skills

For many years, we have used computers to help fight fraud. These are tools that we leverage to find, investigate, and prevent fraud. We weld IDEA and Excel as if they were our sword and shield in the fight against fraud. We train between fights. We learn from every battle and take those experiences into future battles. The best fraud fighters understand their enemies—they know how to think like a fraudster.

I can’t remember the last time I’ve seen a knight in shining armor riding a horse through town. Just like the medieval knights, there may come a time when we as fraud fighters become a thing of the past. As technology advances, will we use computers to automate the fight against fraud? This is a serious question that we must evaluate today.

As Anthony Goldbloom describes in his TED Talk, the automation of tasks by computers will change the jobs of the future. This is a great indication of what could happen to the fraud fighter.  If it does, the fraudster will have a field day because they will figure out ways to exploit the weaknesses of the automation. Over the next few weeks, I will cover the following areas to help you anticipate possible changes within our fraud fighting environment:

• Will you be a disruptor or the disrupted? If you want to be the disrupted, just keep doing what you have always done. If you choose to be the disruptor, be a change ambassador—anticipate, harness, and lead change within your department, organization, and profession.
• What will change? We will see many changes—some will be minor and others will be extreme. There will be changes in the way companies transact business, report to regulators, and use technology. The fraudsters will also change the way they commit fraud. The evidence to quantify and determine fraud schemes will also change.
• When will we see the change? Change happens every day. Only sometimes can we determine the pace of change. It is important to consider the timeframe of possible changes so that we can be prepared.
• What can we do about it? – This will be a call to action and will address the things you can do to prepare for the changes that will impact us as fraud investigators, business professionals, and industry leaders.

Our firm is focused on leading in this area. We are anticipating change and becoming the disruptor to prevent being disrupted. Anticipatory skills are not easily learned or implemented, but we are training our people, weaving them into our strategic planning, and helping our clients understand them. I hope this series will be enlightening.

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