Protection – Prevention

The escalation of business competition, the increasing number of crimes, the quick changes of external circumstances make the protection of our goods, valuables, private and business interests and secrets as well as the detection of the attacks endangering them and the prevention thereof increasingly important. The National Security Office provides protection for some stakeholders of the market that are strategically important for the nation, but protection is just as important for enterprises outside of this scope.

According to surveys, based on the cases that became public, 62 per cent of the Hungarian companies have fallen victim of some serious economic crime in the past two years. The number of victimized companies increased drastically, two and a half folds during the past two years, with which we rank significantly higher than the Central-Eastern-European average (50%) as well as the global average (43%).

During the past two years, nine crimes were committed against Hungarian companies on the average. The most typical types of violation are theft and fraudulence (at 48 per cent of the companies), crimes related to intellectual property (26 per cent), and corruption and bribery (17 per cent).

Economic crimes have caused nearly HUF 4 billion losses to domestic companies in the past two years, of which nearly HUF 1.5 billion could be linked to theft and fraudulence, HUF 1.4 billion to corruption and bribery, and HUF 185 million to violations regarding intellectual property.

The average loss relating to economic crimes reached HUF 62 million per company. Economic crime is the “sport” of white-collar workers in Hungary. The typical perpetrator of the most severe violations is male (90 per cent), typically between 31 and 50 years of age (80 per cent). 64 per cent of the violators have college or university qualification; senior managers commit 27 per cent, while junior managers 20 per cent of the crimes.

According to criminal statistical data, it can be observed, besides a slight increase of the number of detected crimes (2006: 425941 – 2007: 426914), that the number of economic crimes and crimes committed against property (in 2006: 17862 and 260147 – in 2007: 14021 and 276193, respectively) is conspicuously high in relation to other types of crime (47 per cent).

The increasing demand for information resulting from market competition, the increasingly intensive business intelligence of various methods and industrial, economic intelligence efforts remain invisible for the lack of appropriate counter-measures, causing irreversible damage and losses, and their late detection can only result in reconstructing the events, identifying those responsible, and making good use of the “experience”.

Based on the above detailed research and statistical figures the importance and the necessity of detection and prevention is clearly visible, for the sake of which the application of complex measures may become necessary.