“MOST PEOPLE ARE STARTING TO REALIZE THAT THERE ARE ONLY TWO DIFFERENT TYPES OF COMPANIES IN THE WORLD: THOSE THAT HAVE BEEN BREACHED AND KNOW IT AND THOSE THAT HAVE BEEN BREACHED AND DON’T KNOW IT.”
ARTICLE OVERVIEW
Witnessing the convergence of brilliance, the Asia Anti-Fraud Leaders Summit held at ParkRoyal Collection Kuala Lumpur on 24th and 25th May became a hub for professionals dedicated to building a fraud-free society. Industry experts from around the globe gathered to exchange ideas and perspectives on effective prevention tactics against fraud and corruption.
Emnes Events had the privilege of conducting captivating interviews with experts from esteemed organizations such as Abbott Singapore, Swire Coca-Cola Hong Kong, Malaysian Institute of Accountant (MIA), Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission, Wasco Energy Group of Companies, and Dubai Police. These interviews provided profound insights into the strategies employed by these organizations to combat fraudulent activities.
Emnes Events: What are the elements of a successful protection program to secure and protect when your companies are becoming increasingly reliant on digital assets?
Jagathesh Rajavasagam: From digital asset’s point of view the production comes in from identifying your creditable assets and creating invisibility of the assets and the landscape where you are doing the business. As well as creating intelligent risk profile. Once you have that, probably without risk management you are not going to solve the problem, it starts with your visibility, understanding where the risk is. It is important to prioritise it in order to address it on time. From hands on perspective, in the current situation, the technology transformation is so quick and it is inevitable. People and businesses are transforming and new technology comes in which makes the ability to connect with people. With that capability in the past 3-4 years when pandemic came in the mode of operation has changed. Organizations, regardless of their sizes, start seeking for alternative strategies to sustain their business, mostly online. Ever since all this is happening, we as industry practitioners, have been bombarded by multiple requests because the human interaction has been lost. We have to leverage the technology as an enabler to maintain the processes. At the same time, fraudsters are excelling these technologies, they use phishing, spam, malwares and one of the key challenges for us is how to work around it. To sum up, technological capability is enabling businesses to connect at the same time bringing new risks to the organizations.
Jagathesh Rajavasagam
Regional Head, Risk & Cyber Security Officer
Abbott Singapore
Silvia Ihensekhien
Director of Information Security & Risk Management
Swire Coca-Cola Hong Kong
Emnes Events: What are the challenges and barriers in designing and implementing a reliable fraud detection program with a robust framework for a solid data analytic plan?
Silvia Ihensekhien: The challenge of fraud detection is that it is coming from everywhere. According to PWC global survey, cybercrimes is the first ranking among all other crimes. That is why I have a job (laughs). Fraud detection system is all about having various methods, you cannot simply rely on the basic transaction handling, you need to have a real-time analysis including machine learning and AI. As there is a lot of data that needs to be analysed you need technology. The transaction data can be learnt based on past history while the real-time threats can be detected with the help of technology. The way that we are dealing with fraud prevention, the attackers are using exactly same method with implementation of AI, Chat GPT, sending good phishing emails etc. It is a kind of competition. What I am seeing in the organization facing all this, we need to prioritise what is important and use combination of methods, not putting everything in one basket, otherwise the cost will be too high which affects the business in negative way. It is also crucial to monitor what is going on in the market and learn from others and their experience.
Emnes Events: Fraud during pandemic and role that internal auditors played to protect companies against cyber and phishing fraud-lessons learnt during Covid?
Faisal Malik: Post pandemic, the internal auditors have to rewrite policies and procedures within organizations and it is not just about policy documentation process, the people as well need to be well equipped. Especially with digital adoption. There are still many of them lacking in terms of phishing scenarios when it comes to digital adoption and gap like digital signatures, remote meetings where there are rooms for manipulation of for example voting exercise. When it comes to using the AI role to site seeing certain assets in audit verification process. Those are the things that impose greater risk to the organizations in validating the assets and procedures set by the regulators. The impact of the risk can be greater than the investment into technology.
Faisal Malik
Vice President
Malaysian Institute at Accountant (MIA)
Zaitul Akmam Ghaifullah
Head, Internal Audit Department
Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC)
Emnes Events: How is the new and evolving role of internal auditors in the era of cyber, social engineering and phishing attacks?
Zaitul Akmam Ghaifullah: Before pandemic the process was quite slow in terms of organization security, network, data protection from scammers, cyber-attacks. It was not really highlighted well by some organizations. Covid-19 has accelerated the digital transformation and importance of cybersecurity protection. From MCMC perspective, I can see that as a regulator we have network security department in which we collaborate with PDRM as well as other agencies such as Bank Negara, Cybersecurity Commission and other government agencies. We work as a task force to protect the public in terms of providing guidelines and raising awareness to combat scammers who are using such platforms as Internet and telecommunication providers in fraudulent activities. We also work together with service providers in telecommunication in order to prevent cybercrimes. Overall, I believe that we are on the right path, of course, there are a lot more things to learn, we have to think like scammers in order to understand how they work as we want to be one step ahead.
Emnes Events: Examining hi-tech oriented trends and practices in money laundering and corruption, how to overcome the threat with smart use of technologies available?
Deputy Commissioner Dato’ Mohamad Zamri bin Zainul Abidin: There are many things that we need to look at and what aspect of crime that we are talking about. If we are talking about money laundering, we deal with people in proceed of crime and about the type of asset. If we are talking about crypto, of course we need to have the technological tools such as chain analysis in order to trace crypto transactions.
If we go back to the times before money laundering became digital. In an example of banking system, STR for suspicious transactions and CTR for cash threshold – this is where the bank sometimes needs to have an automated system because if they have a manual system you need to manually detect the transactions. But if you have a system, you can set it based on transaction patterns. If one person periodically makes transactions for the same amount, the system can identify this pattern.
Sometimes when we are doing our investigations, we have to work together with telecommunication providers, MCMC, Cybersecurity Commission as we try to tap into the data before we conduct a raid. We analyse the phone call and transaction patterns of a suspect for some time in order to reveal the crime and have evidence. It wouldn’t be possible without help of technology.
Deputy Commissioner Dato’ Mohamad Zamri bin Zainul Abidin
Director of the Anti-Money Laundering Division
Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission
Amanda Chong
Vice President, Corporate Communications
& Branding
Wasco Energy Group of Companies
Emnes Events: How to cultivate culture of the 2-way flow of information within a company in 2 various methods: verbal and non-verbal communication?
Amanda Chong: Cultivating the 2 way flow of communications verbally can be done in a few methods such as an open door policy. This is where staff can feel comfortable in discussing issues, suggestions, ideas, challenges in a non-judgemental way. Another method is organising townhall meetings quarterly in year. This will be able to promote high engagement between staff and senior management on addressing certain issues, feedbacks etc. Last but not least, is to have team huddles which promotes a more informal way of communications where team members may be more comfortable in a small group of people to voice out their feedback.
With regards to non-verbal communications, will be internal communication collateral such as e-newletters, intranet to communicate company updates and changes. While employee surveys are key to understanding what employees want in a company to foster better relations, commitment and most of all engagement.
Emnes Events: What are the new and unforeseen vulnerabilities that 5G enabled organizations are prone to and how to root them out?
Associate Professor of Criminal Investigation & Investigation Hossam Mohamed Nabil: 5G is a new technology that has a high speed of transferring data. It is suitable for robotics, AI and virtual reality, Metaverse, Quantum Computing and so on. As we progress in the use of technology, it can be used for good things as well as bad. Criminals are studying technology in order to get benefits, steal assets and compromise emails in order to get personal data to extort or blackmail someone or entities. Technology can improve organization’s work by boosting the processes to be faster and more efficient, as well as data being stored on cloud but it also puts a lot of pressure on them to secure that data from hacking.
Hossam Mohamed Nabil
Member of Criminal Investigation Section, Head of Police Management Section
Dubai Police
Undoubtedly, the world is grappling with significant challenges in cybersecurity, corruption prevention, and fraud mitigation. Asia Anti-Fraud Leaders Summit 2023 emerged as a critical platform for all participants to join forces, exchange knowledge, build meaningful connections, and seek inspiration. Together, they explored a multitude of approaches and techniques aimed at protecting organizations from the pervasive threat of cyber-attacks.
The collective efforts and dedication showcased at the summit reaffirm our commitment to tackling issues such as money laundering and other cyber-crimes. As we set our sights on the horizon, let us continue to collaborate, innovate, and pave the way for a responsible ecosystem that benefits all. We heartfully thank all delegates, Supporting and Media Partners as well as esteemed Speakers for making this event an absolute success. Looking forward to welcoming everyone back next year!
MEDIA PARTNERS
24-25 MAY 2023
26 MAY | POST SUMMIT MASTERCLASS
KUALA LUMPUR | HYBRID