Source: newsthemegh.com
For the year ending in 2022, banks and other financial institutions in the nation reported total losses from fraud of GHS 56 million.
Nevertheless, this is a 7.8% decrease from the GHS 61 million reported in 2021, according to information from the 2022 fraud report put together by the Bank of Ghana’s Financial Stability Department.
The report detailed fraudulent acts that these institutions had either attempted or successfully carried out.
The others were specialist deposit-taking institutions and payment service providers in addition to the banks.
Forgery and document manipulation, fraudulent withdrawals, check fraud, cyber/email fraud, and cash theft, also known as cash suppression, were the top five fraud activities that affected the majority of the institutions in the industry.
The remaining crimes included impersonation, lending and credit fraud, ATM fraud, burglary, e-money fraud, and others.
The results show that a substantial effort at fraud with a loss of GHC165 million occurred in 2022.
There were 15,164 fraud instances reported overall throughout this time.
Out of this total, the PSP sector reported 12,166 cases, or 80% of the overall number of fraud cases, while the banks and SDIs reported 2,998 cases, or 20% and 20%, respectively, of the total number of fraud cases.
While employee fraud is still a problem, the numbers have started to decline as a result of the Bank of Ghana’s stringent punishments and the sector institutions’ adamant support for stronger controls.
The Bank of Ghana will continue to work with law enforcement agencies to deal with the prosecution of fraud suspects through the Committee for Cooperation between Law Enforcement Agencies and the Banking Committee (COCLAB).