In our last year’s blog post, “Background screening in the financial sector”, we revealed key facts on the importance of screening policies and a trend of such practices to form an integral part of fraud risk management program. Our continual research to study the fraud patterns perpetrated in 2013 by bank employees yielded that banking organisations in the public and private sectors, co-operative banks and multi-national banks failed to adopt precautions, which resulted in enormous monetary frauds. Identity theft, fraudulent documentation, misuse of Power of Attorney/account takeover and lack of oversight by line managers or senior management on deviations from existing process/controls were all attributed in banking fraud incidents which occurred last year. A banking fraud survey has stated that such fraudulent activities were also highlighted in 2012. Also, in the wake of absolutely cutthroat competition, regulatory authorities have stepped up on policy standards to minimise discrepancies in the banking business, putting banks under immense performance pressure and the constant need to safeguard consumer interest. This should essentially make continual background checks a part of standard operating procedure for the benefit of implementing best practices. It is important that as employers, people readily imbibe risk management strategy in their regular duty of hiring. Many organisations prefer to play safe by not hiring people with criminal/ legal history. But, how often is this diligence practiced after hiring? Recently, media was ablaze with the news of an ex-associate of a prominent bank misusing his official capacity to fulfil his vested interests. This not only gave the bank negative publicity by exposing the loopholes in their banking system, but also led to heavy stock losses. Despite the magnitude of this multi-crore fraud, this is not an isolated event. The financial market is rife with crimes of similar nature. The rise of such occurrences among many others are forcing organisations to rehash their hiring framework to safeguard their businesses and themselves against industry malpractices/ crimes. Along with popular pre-hiring background screening processes, companies are actively adopting continual screening policies to regularly monitor and check their employees to keep collateral damages at bay. Even otherwise, as the market competition heats up, legislation keeps getting tougher. Insurances are expensive and difficult to obtain. Customers and shareholders are more aware and critical than before and want to pass off legal responsibilities to their suppliers. Also, the passing time has brought about a humongous change in management policies as more and more players vie for a global field. This makes the identification, assessment and control of possible economic risks more necessary than ever before. Overlooking the importance of risk management in the present times can severely beleaguer the netting competency of any business. driver booster 5 pro license key