Why do people commit fraud? Anyone is capable of committing fraud if the conditions and opportunity is present and available. The basic principle of the fraud triangle will help you see how perpetrators participate or contribute to fraud. The profile of a fraud perpetrator varies from demographic and psychological characteristics of honest people. They are some characteristics that differentiate fraud perpetrators from other criminals such as age and sex. Fraud offenders are usually older and 30% were women. The data librarian as innocent as she may appear is the person who maintains the custody of an entities data in a large firm. This IT person holds a lot of information. Needless to say IT and accounting controls go hand in hand simply because of the digital environment that we currently live in. In addition the database administration who grants access to specific data resources, that person is also very important to accounting and internal controls. Shockingly, many were educated, more religious and less likely to be substance abusers. These people were willing to compromise their integrity, loyalty and trust commit fraud.The fraud triangle consists for perceived pressure, rationalization and perceived opportunity.The pressure were financial, vice related and work related. These opportunities occurred in controlled environments where duties were segregated with checks and balances that were designed to provide internal audits. Yet fraud occurred. Some sense of rationalization occurred in the perpetrator's mind to justify the act. Then if the fraud goes undetected, the perpetrator recruits more victims into the scheme which introduces power into the dynamic and hence the cycle repeats itself. The rewards begin to outweigh the consequences which leads to a more power and perceived success. This is the objective description of the fraud triangle that fraud detectors must be aware of to detect and prevent fraud.

DQ: discuss the common rationalizations used by fraud perpetrators?