While economic crime against organizations has risen nationally with 37% of organizations experiencing it, Alberta has reported lower instances of such crime, finds a PwC survey.
“While Alberta sits below the national average, the threats from economic crime continue to evolve,” says Krista Mooney, Director of PwC’s Forensic Services in Alberta. “Savvy fraudsters adapt to the trends that affect all organizations and economic crime will continue to be a major concern.”
In terms of business threats to their organization, Alberta businesses are most concerned about cyber threats, including lack of data security (68%), the inability to protect intellectual property (50%) and bribery and corruption (25%).
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One-in-five Albertans has been a victim of some sort of identity theft or fraud in the past 12 months. This includes credit card fraud (8%) and their e-mail being hacked (8%).
Overall business confidence across Canada remains steady.
And confidence in the economy is identical between Alberta businesses and consumers. Since August 2014, consumers confidence has risen, particularly when it comes to buying major household items (9.9% increase) and buying a house (6.9% increase).