Unexpected events such as fraud, bribery, sanctions or regulatory breaches, and integrity issues can occur in any business. These incidents demand quick and robust responses to prevent escalation and protect an organisation's brand and value.
Allegations and issues must be investigated thoroughly, discreetly and quickly, with minimal disruption to the business. This requires a breadth of skills particularly when there are large volumes of disparate data that need assimilating and understanding. Our experienced and multi-disciplinary Forensic Investigations Team can provide swift and effective support to help organisations get to the facts and use them to address the allegations or issues at hand.
Increased regulation and regulator activity
From the expansion of sanctions requirements and increased attention on anti-corruption investigations, to new and upcoming ESG regulation, failure to keep pace with changes in the regulatory environment poses a significant risk to organisations' business models.
Heightened economic pressure and stakeholder expectations
Many businesses are facing increasing reputational, financial and legal consequences as a result of consumers, the media and regulators who publicly seek to hold organisations to account.
With the added pressure of 24 hour news and social media, organisations need to quickly determine and evaluate the facts when a scandal does erupt. Scandals often lead to scrutiny of organisations’ corporate governance, commonly resulting in demands for resignations of senior executives and/or significant financial consequences.
Emerging technology and GenAI
The pace at which technology, and specifically GenAI, is creating a race for businesses to capitalise on the new tools that are available including for fraud detection, prevention and investigation. Simultaneously, criminals are beginning to use GenAI and other technologies to perpetrate ever more sophisticated fraud.
The exponential volumes of data that companies now collect and store creates a risk of mishandling of data, privacy law violations and cyber security breaches. Conversely, using data in the right way provides an opportunity to understand the facts more quickly and clearly when an incident of any kind needs investigating.
Financial investigations
We support our clients in investigating accounting issues or financial irregularities whether they have arisen through fraud, economic crime or genuine error.
Our highly skilled team of forensic accounting specialists help clients to understand the nature and impact of alleged financial misstatements. As part of these investigations, we are experienced in liaising with relevant regulatory bodies such as the FCA (Financial Conduct Authority), FRC (Financial Reporting Council), SFO (Serious Fraud Office), DOJ (Department of Justice) and SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission).
We continually invest in the latest data analytic technology, enabling our team to use a range of tools capable of analysing high volumes of transactional data, to identify indicators of fraud and/or manipulation.
Examples of financial issues where our Forensic investigations team can help include:
- allegations of misstated financial information
- asset misappropriation
- economic crime
- system related accounting errors
- fraud related whistleblower reports or tip offs
- suspicious transactions
- accounting 'black hole' investigations
- bribery allegations
Incident and integrity investigations
Our Forensic Investigations Team have vast experience in conducting incident and integrity investigations. These investigations can cover a wide range of non-financial incidents or integrity issues, some of which are shown in the wheel below. When such incidents occur we can move quickly to establish the facts including identification, capture and analysis of the necessary data. This commonly involves forensic email/document review, interviews and analysis of structured data.
We can provide robust, thorough and independent interrogation of the facts to respond swiftly and appropriately. In situations of regulatory scrutiny, this can include supporting clients and their external legal counsel in responding to requests for information from regulatory bodies.
Investigations are tailored to the scale, industry and regulatory expertise required to provide impartial assessment and remedial actions.
Examples of incident and integrity issues where our Forensic Investigations team can help include:
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Investigations as a Managed Service
Access the breadth of PwC’s investigations services through our flexible managed service model.
Our innovative Investigations as a Managed Service allows you to quickly and flexibly augment your existing investigations capacity with our subject matter experts, as and when you need it, or to fully outsource your investigative function, using pre-agreed commercials to derive value.
Investigative analytics and eDiscovery
Our Forensic Investigations Team are supported by our well established eDiscovery and Investigative Analytics specialists who can help identify, extract, transform and analyse vast amounts of electronic data often in time critical situations.
We pride ourselves on our technological expertise, in-house technologies and our alliances with cutting edge technology companies, which we leverage for a variety of projects, including investigations.
Examples of how we have helped our clients
Regional utilities business - Regulatory investigation
In response to queries raised by external stakeholders in relation to the completeness and accuracy of environmental reporting to regulators, we undertook an investigation to assess the validity of the allegations. Our comprehensive investigation included data analytics, eDiscovery, investigative interviews and site visits to inform our analysis and determine the factual circumstances relevant to the allegations. We delivered an independent report that stood up to regulator scrutiny, addressed the substance of the allegations and provided management with procedural recommendations.
FTX Digital Markets Limited - Investigation support for liquidation
We assisted the Provisional Liquidators with their investigation into the winding up petition presented to FTX Digital Markets Limited (“FTX”). We were engaged due to FTX’s scale, profile and complexity and our ability to harness and deploy deep specialist expertise from our global network. The investigation is ongoing, with our restructuring and forensics teams leading workstreams on key financial restructuring and insolvency support, forensics, cryptoassets data capture, claims and investigations expertise.
British Business Bank - Fraud and error investigation
PwC UK worked with the British Business Bank ("BBB"), the UK’s state-owned development bank, to provide expert services to assist the BBB to investigate and measure levels of fraud and error in the government's three key pandemic business support lending schemes.
Find out more about our work here: British Business Bank case study
Large multi-national company in the Energy, Utilities & Resources industry - bribery and corruption investigation
We were engaged to assist the company and its outside-counsel in their response to regulatory inquiries relating to allegations of bribery and corruption across multiple jurisdictions. Our team handled the forensic accounting (e.g., review of accounting records), e-discovery (e.g., collection, hosting, production) and data analytics efforts. In conjunction with these efforts, we have prepared a number of deliverables leveraged by the client and its counsel as part of their legal analysis. We have undertaken calculations of the disgorgement and penalties arising from the profits obtained. The investigation is ongoing, and we are also supporting the company with executing their compliance programme.
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