Forensic Accounting and Investigation case studies.
Forensic Accounting and Investigation case studies.
GSI Services
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Cyber security services:
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Establishing source of data breach.
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Establishing whether a theft of data had taken place.
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GDPR review and report:
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Risk of data loss.
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Advisory and reporting to ICO
Key facts
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Data held on the server covered a period of 10 years.
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A significant amount of personal and confidential data was at risk.
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It was possible that their IT support company had been compromised.
Type of business:
Insolvency Practitioner
Our client:
Insolvency Practitioner
The case
GSI was approached by an insolvency practitioner who had been the victim of a ransomware attack. All files on their server had been encrypted and were no longer accessible.
GSI solution
Ransomware is usually about obtaining a payment to unencrypt files. Data theft is less common in this situation but where there is data loss, it must be reported to the ICO. We were able to establish where the attack came from and the approximate time of the attack. By examining the company’s routers and through other means, we proved that subsequent to the ransomware attack, very little data had been transmitted by the server, so it could not have been stolen.
We also examined access points and established that the ransomware had used a gateway through the company’s IT support contractor. We raised the alarm to increase security of their servers and avoid replication with other clients.
Our in house lawyer and GDPR expert prepared a report to fully comply with GDPR and we ensured protection of all sensitive data. The ransomware issue was resolved without the need to pay a ransom and the company was operational again a couple of days later.
GSI Services
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Data recovery of deleted data
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Accounts data correction
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Data entry
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Accounts production
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Forensic analysis
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Report of conclusions for court
Key facts
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Accounts prepared to six months prior to insolvency on Xero.
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Large sums paid out of company to holding company through complex inter-company transactions prior to insolvency.
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Erratic trends in commissions received and clawed back during final months of trading.
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Missing records such as emails and commission statements.
Type of business:
Insurance agent – £15m turnover
Our client:
Insolvency Practitioner
The case
The company was an insurance agent selling insurance policies of major insurers such as Aviva. It went into liquidation after substantial clawbacks of commission. GSI was approached by the liquidator to carry out a forensic analysis of the accounts, which were not up to date.
GSI solution
The liquidator had possession of the server. Our in house cryptologist analysed the hard drive and recovered 89,000 deleted emails along with attachments which included hundreds of commission statements. We completed the accounts to the date of liquidation and examined commission statements to establish dates of clawback notifications. Our final report showed that the directors had at least 2.4 months notice of clawbacks which meant that they should have been aware of the potential losses before they paid out substantial sums in dividends and other payments to related parties. The directors agreed an out of court settlement to pay substantial sums back into the liquidation, to the benefit of the creditors.
GSI Services
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Recreation of data from paper records
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data entry and accounts production
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investigating payments to related parties
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forensic analysis with specific regard to director conduct
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Report of conclusions for court
Key facts
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Accounts data file had gone missing for last 18 months of trade.
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Large company expenditure for non-business related purchases luxury assets.
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Missing records such as emails and electronic data.
Type of business:
Multi surgery veterinary practice – £2m turnover
Our client:
Insolvency Practitioner
The case
The company was a multi surgery veterinary practice. It went into liquidation with Crown debt of £750,000 as well as other unsecured creditors. GSI was approached by the liquidator to create an accounts data file from prime paper records, contained in 28 archive storage boxes.
GSI solution
Examination of the contents of 28 archive storage boxes of paper records, extracting all relevant accounting records.
Creation of an accounts data file with analysis of individual transactions and tracing of expenditure involving non company related third parties. Establishing whether those third parties were actually connected to the stakeholders. Covert surveillance of premises purchased with company funds.
We completed the compilation and subsequent forensic review of the financial information and reported to our client accordingly. The insolvency practitioner instructed solicitors to place charges on assets held personally by the company’s stakeholders and the directors agreed an out of court settlement to pay substantial sums back into the liquidation, to the benefit mainly of HMRC
GSI Services
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Documents investigation
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Tracing main characters involved in business
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Asset tracing
Key facts
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Investor had an employee on site in South Africa who was not making progress.
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Key contacts and facilitators not appearing to act in client’s interests.
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Title to assets uncertain and whereabouts unknown.
Type of business:
Investment in a business in Africa
Our client:
Private Investor
The case
Our client invested in a business in Africa and acquired a substantial amount of stock for export, which could not be released through Customs. There was some uncertainty relating to title to the assets. The situation had stalled with no way of proceeding with recovery of assets and export abroad but ongoing costs continued to be incurred.
GSI solution
GSI deployed two personnel from our intelligence team to South Africa. They met with the key contacts and investigated their activities. They found those activities to be suspicious and replicated across many of their “clients”.
Tracing the assets involved travel to locations considered hostile. An armed, covert operation was expedited, which resulted in evidence of fraud, theft and money laundering being presented to the Serious Organised Crime police
department, with possible prosecutions cross border back to Europe. Potential recovery of stolen assets is possible but probability is low.
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