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The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether a change of corporate governance occurs after financial crimes in Canada revealed through external whistleblowing.

Based on the methodology of Smaili and Arroyo (2019), the authors implement a qualitative research framework to examine 11 alleged Canadian corporate financial statement fraud cases publicly exposed during the 1995–2012 period.

The analysis suggests that firms had a weak traditional corporate governance mechanism before the external whistleblowing occurred. In almost every case, the chief executive officer (CEO) was also the chair of the board of directors. Although the reports by Dey and Saucier recommend that independent directors make up at least 75% of Canadian boards, we note that the percentage of independent directors was under 70% in six cases. Moreover, only two firms had a whistleblowing policy in place, and seven firms had a major shareholder. Regarding the consequences for corporate governance after whistleblowing, the analysis shows that the companies that survived the whistleblowing had enhanced their internal corporate governance by the third year after the whistleblowing. In fact, at all the surviving companies, the CEO was no longer the chair, and the percentage of independent directors had increased to 80%. However, for those survival companies that did not have a whistleblowing policy before the event, the situation did not change quickly, and they only implemented a policy after the enforcement of the new regulation in the year 2003.

This paper adds new insights to the research on financial crime by investigating the relation between corporate governance and whistleblowing.

This study investigates the relation between the board of directors' attributes and corporate social performance. The authors examine three board of directors: characteristics, size, independence and gender diversity, and how they interact with industry to affect corporate social performance.

The authors use a multivariate approach to analyze and compare the effects of governance variables on two aspects of corporate social performance, its environmental and social dimensions.

Based on a sample of 983 firm-year observations, our main findings indicate that board independence, size and gender diversity each has a different impact on the environmental and social dimensions of performance, but that industrial sector moderates these effects. In particular, our results show that board member independence is positively associated with the environmental dimension of the performance of all the sample industries, but only has a positive association with the social dimension when the firms are in industries other than those that are environmentally sensitive. For these latter industries, board independence is negatively associated with the social dimension. Board size is positively associated with the environmental dimension for environmentally sensitive industries only and with the social dimension for all the industries examined, with a stronger positive effect on the latter in regard to environmentally sensitive industries.

Women directors appear to raise social and environmental concerns within the board, as evidenced by their positive effect on the firms' social and environmental performance, with a stronger impact on the former.

Regulators can promote changes to the way Canadian companies select directors for the purpose of achieving sustainable performance while investors will be better informed about the impact of some of the board attributes on the environmental and social dimension of performance.

This study provides a portrait of the impact of governance attributes on the environmental and social dimension of performance of Canadian companies. Given the increasing interest in gender diversity in recent years, this study provides new evidence on the benefits of female board members for the two non-financial dimensions of performance.

This paper aims to discuss the importance of an effective internal whistleblowing system in building a more ethical organizational climate.

This study draws on the literature to make recommendations for organizations, managers and boards of directors regarding implementing an effective whistleblowing process.

This paper offers practical information on what constitutes an appropriate level of preparedness and responsiveness. Organizations can reinforce their internal ethics by encouraging whistleblowers to report complaints internally. An effective whistleblowing process depends on the organization’s desire to build an ethical climate and its awareness of the power of whistleblowing as an ethical tool.

This study will help managers and other professionals to create and maintain an ethical climate by implementing an effective whistleblowing process. The discussion in this paper is important for any type of organization concerned with empowering whistleblowers and the whistleblowing process.

This paper draws on prior studies on the readability of corporate financial disclosures to discuss why readability should be a concern for firms. Guidance and recommendations are offered to help firms improve their financial disclosures.

The authors base their analysis on the management and accounting literature on readability.

This paper presents the main causes and consequences of complexity in corporate disclosures and identifies four disclosure writing styles: obfuscation, informativeness, deception and avoidance. This paper suggests that firms concerned about the readability of their communications use a balanced strategy and proposes some practical actions for its implementation.

This paper makes several contributions by offering insights into questions that should be raised by top management and the board of directors, including: Why care about readability? What are the causes and consequences of low readability? What strategies can we adopt and how should we implement them?

The purpose of this paper is to provide a review of the literature on white-collar crime that combines the perspectives of criminology and management sciences research.

Based on a systematic review of white-collar crime recidivism, this paper defines crime and the white-collar criminal from a different perspective. The literature review was conducted using a multidisciplinary approach.

This paper offers an insightful discussion of white-collar recidivism. In particular, it highlights the interesting use of “Post Conviction Risk Assessment,” a tool used in criminology literature, and aims to show that the probability of recidivism in white-collar crime can be effectively measured and evaluated. This tool is commonly used by American professionals in combatting criminal recidivism.

This study provides interesting insights into white-collar crime recidivism. It has a number of implications for probation officers and criminologists evaluating the recidivism risk of white-collar criminals for reintegration purposes.

The purpose of this study is to examine the risks of the metaverse ecosystem. This study provides an overview of the metaverse and its evolution and discusses the various fraud risks it poses for organizations (including boards of directors, forensic accountants, auditors and accountants). Given the advantages of the metaverse and the growing interest it is attracting from organizations, this paper sheds light on the importance of mitigating its risks.

Based on a systematic review of the literature on the metaverse and analysis of the fraud triangle, this study examines the different fraud risks it poses. More specifically, this study analyzes 21 articles on the metaverse published between 2021 and 2022 and attempts to answer the following research questions: What are the risks inherent in the metaverse? What are the fraud risks associated with it? What are the opportunities and pressures it brings? What is the rationalization underlying its use? This study conducts the analysis on two levels, that of the individual (user) and that of the organization. This paper summarizes the findings of publications on the metaverse in 2021 and 2022 to discover its various definitions and the opportunities and risks it represents.

This paper offers an insightful discussion of the advantages and risks the metaverse can bring. Because this analysis shows that any organization could be vulnerable to metaverse risks, this study provides organizations with strategies to deter, detect and prevent fraud and reputational risks. Regulatory bodies, financial authorities, board of directors and fraud investigators should all consider these risks before investing in the metaverse.

This paper adds new insights to the scarce research on the metaverse and cybersecurity by exploring the opportunities and risks it presents. It has several implications for organizations, boards of directors, management and regulatory authorities.

The purpose of this study is to discuss the harmful use of deepfakes in an organizational context, based on the only two cases the authors found that were addressed by the media from the perspective of corporate fraud. This study offers an overview of deepfake technology, and in particular, examines five W questions to better decipher the impact of these tools on organizations: What is deepfake? Who is the fraudster and who is targeted? Why use them and how? And What after? Based on these five W questions, this study provides an in-depth discussion of the two cases identified. Even though this technology has several advantages, this study examines its dark side.

Using comparative analysis, the authors study the only two known and publicized fraud cases by using deepfakes that have targeted chief executive officers to date.

The paper provides an extensive picture of the unethical and illicit use of deepfakes in an organizational context and discusses how this technology could affect fraud risk. In addition, the analysis of cases shows that voice-generating software, combined with other fraud schemes such as business email compromise, facilitates the commission of the fraud, as the victims feel confident because they recognize the speaker’s voice and emails. The analysis shows that any organization could be vulnerable to this technology. The median costs of this type of fraud can be high. For the two cases identified, the estimated losses amounted to US$243,000 and US$35,000,000, respectively.

This paper adds new insights to the scarce research on deepfakes and financial crime by investigating the causes and consequences of the unethical and illicit use of deepfakes. It has several implications for organizations, boards of directors, management and regulatory authorities.

The purpose of this study is to investigate whether large blockholders are associated with financial statement fraud at their companies. Although a substantial body of prior studies has focused on chief executive officers’ motivations to manipulate financial statements, the correlation between majority shareholders and financial statement fraud has received little attention. This paper aims to fill this gap by investigating whether the sample firms have controlling shareholders or executives (i.e. blockholders vs management) and whether financial statement fraud schemes, motivations and consequences differ between blockholder- and management-controlled firms.

Using a clinical approach, the authors Study 12 Canadian financial statement fraud cases uncovered by the Ontario Securities Commission between 1997 and 2020.

First, the authors find blockholder control in six cases. These findings infer that these large shareholders received private benefits at the expense of minority shareholders. The comparative analyzes suggest that fraudulent firms controlled by blockholders go bankrupt more often than those controlled by managers. The authors also find that improper disclosure is the most common fraud scheme in blockholder-controlled firms.

The authors conduct a deep analysis of financial statement fraud cases to examine the of blockholder control on the likelihood of financial statement fraud. This paper adds new insights to the research on financial crime by investigating whether large shareholders affect the probability of fraud and the extent to which they might do so.