White-collar Crime

These are not victimless crimes. 

A single scam can destroy a company, devastate families by wiping out their life savings, or cost investors billions of dollars (or even all three). Today’s fraud schemes are more sophisticated than ever, and the FBI is dedicated to using its skills to track down the culprits and stop scams before they start.

white-collar crime work integrates the analysis of intelligence with its investigations of criminal activities such as:

• Public Corruption

  Public corruption involves a breach of public trust and/or abuse of position by federal, state, or local officials and their private sector accomplices.

• Money Laundering

  Money laundering is the process by which criminals conceal or disguise their proceeds and make them appear to have come from legitimate sources. Money laundering allows criminals to hide and accumulate wealth, avoid prosecution, evade taxes, increase profits through reinvestment, and ther criminal activity. While many definitions for money laundering exist, it can be defined very simply as turning “dirty” money into “clean” money. And it’s a significant crime—money ng can undermine the integrity and stability of financial ions and systems, discourage foreign investment and distort ional capital flows.

• Corporate Fraud

  Corporate fraud consists of illegal, deceptive actions committed either by a company or an individual who is an employee of the company. Many corporate fraud schemes are highly complicated accounting schemes used to inflate a company's apparent profits and may take years to detect.

• Securities and Commodities Fraud

  Securities fraud, also known as stock fraud and investment fraud, is a deceptive practice in the stock or commodities markets that induce investors to make a purchase or sale decisions based on false information, frequently resulting in losses, in violation of securities laws.

• Mortgage Fraud

  Mortgage fraud refers to an intentional misstatement, misrepresentation, or omission of the information relied upon by an underwriter or lender to fund, purchase, or insure a loan secured by real property.

• Financial Institution Fraud

  Financial fraud is the use of potentially illegal means to obtain money, assets, or other property owned or held by a financial institution, or to obtain money from depositors by fraudulently posing as a bank or other financial institutions. For this reason, Financial fraud is sometimes considered a white-collar crime.

• Bank Fraud and Embezzlement

  Bank fraud if he or she devises a scheme to defraud a financial institution. Debit and credit card fraud, along with check fraud are the most common types of bank fraud cases prosecuted. Debit and credit card fraud cases are discovered once the bank is notified by a client that an unauthorized transaction has occurred. Check fraud is often discovered by the banks themselves. Banks and other financial institutions have sophisticated mechanisms in place to ensure checks being cashed or deposited are legitimate. Of course, banks do not have a perfect system in place and often people or entities can get a fraudulent check through the bank’s system. Embezzlement is a form of theft. Embezzlement occurs when an individual is entrusted with his or her employer’s money and this individual converts this money for their own use. A common example of embezzlement is an employee stealing company funds. Embezzlement can be both a state and federal offense dependent on the parties involved. If an individual steals money from a financial institution such as a bank or any other federal entity, then the offense is a federal offense. If an individual steals money from a private company or a state-funded entity, then the individual will be charged with a state offense.

• Fraud Against the Government

  Fraud against the government may consist of fraud in connection with federal government contracting and fraud in connection with federal and/or federally-funded entitlement programs, including public housing, agricultural programs, defense procurement fraud, educational programs, and corporate frauds.

• Election Law Violations

  Election fraud can involve corruption in voter registration, balloting, and vote counting and certification for the purpose of her ensuring or increasing the chances of the election of a candidate favored by those committing the fraud. Election fraud also covers proceedings related to primary elections.

• Mass Marketing Fraud

  Mass marketing fraud occurs when a person or persons use the mail, email, telephones, and other mass communication options to try to get money out of people in a fraudulent manner.

• Health Care Fraud

  Health care fraud is a type of white-collar crime that involves the filing of dishonest health care claims to turn a profit. Fraudulent health care schemes come in many forms. health insurance fraud, drug fraud, and medical fraud. Health insurance fraud occurs when a company or an individual defrauds an insurer or government health care program, such as Medicare or equivalent State programs.