The level of risks and the frequency of actual fraud and corruption incidents in sports industry can be explained, first of all, by the fact that sports is globally associated with $145 billion business and billions of stakeholders, from players, coaches and sponsors on out to national governments and fans. The ever-increasing number of scandals related with fixed matches, fraudulent schemes involving management of sports clubs and associations, as well as corruption schemes at government level, has brought the public tolerance to the boil.

«Corruption is for sport as doping is for competition... This framework has provided many reasons, motivations, contradictions and counter-intuitions, which build and today form one of the most enabling environments for acts of corruption to take place and proliferate, allowing the corrupt and greedy to gain an interest in sport, and impunity to take hold.» (Transparency International). It is worth noting that sports is a ‘tasty morsel’ leaving OPEN ever increasing problems of ‘Siamese twins’ – fraud and corruption – even in the developed economies.

Key forensic services for sports organizations

• Forensic Data Analytics tests developed in the context of sports business for the purpose of efficient detection of zones featured by relatively higher risk of fraudulent practices (this tool makes it possible to obtain results more quickly and, hence, reduce the investigation budget)
• Computer Forensic – (1) extraction and analysis of data from corporation mobile devices and work computers; (2) analysis of integration and access rights for various databases
• Forensic Affiliation Analysis – Identification of direct and indirect relations between the examined organization employees and the contractors that can/could give rise to the conflict of interest and, hence, misuse

• Unfounded payments in player transfers, including to individuals not directly involved in transfers
• Refusal to extend contracts with players thus robbing the club of eventual money associated with player transfers
• Signing and especially re-signing of contracts if considerable relocation allowance is available
• Withdrawing money from the club, including through contracts benefitted by the image of players
• Concealed remuneration to agents, including through consulting and other contracts
• Unfounded bonus and premium payments, in particular, through veiled payments (houses, cars, etc.)
• Misuse in selling (including via Internet) sports attributes
• Fictitious, double and/or excessive purchases and spending (marketing, infrastructure maintenance) aimed at deriving personal gain, inter alia by involving contractors affiliated with key personnel
• Excessive expenses for the organization of sports gatherings, inter alia by involving agent companies associated with club management

• Providing support in proceedings in arbitration courts of constituent entities of the Russian Federation, courts of general jurisdiction, and other courts.
• Counseling on corporate law matters.
• Providing of legal assistance and defense in administrative and criminal corporate cases.
• Representing clients’ interests during tax audits, searches, and seizures.

Compliance services in accordance with the requirements of Russian and international anti-corruption laws.

• Assessment of corruption/bribery risks according to Russian and international anti-corruption laws (FCPA, UKBA).
• Development of recommendations for the improvement of the corruption/bribery risk management system.
• Assistance to the implementation of the anti-corruption compliance system.
• Provision of comprehensive range of independent, anonymous and confidential hot line services.
• Assistance in checking anonymous reports on violation of the anti-corruption laws./p>

Corporate fraud and regulatory risk management.

• Business process analysis for the compliance with regulatory legal acts and local regulatory documents.
• Analysis of sufficiency of the detail level of the regulatory documents.
• Estimation of the efficiency of accounting systems with regard to unauthorized changes.
• Assessment of fraud risks with the following development of recommendations for the improvement and facilitation of the internal control system.