(Montreal) Statistics Canada, which had never asked Canadians before 2019 if they had been victims of fraud, finds that this type of crime far exceeds what police officers know about it: more people said they had been victims of at least one fraud than any other type of crime in the 12 months preceding the survey.
The federal agency released a series of data on Monday after asking questions for the first time about fraud experienced by respondents in the 2019 General Social Survey (GSS) on the safety of Canadians.
We learn that four years ago, the number of victims of fraud, or 2.5 million people (7.8% of the population aged 15 and over), was higher than the number of victims of all violent crimes combined, namely sexual assault, robbery and assault, which affected just under 1.4 million victims (4.3% of the population).
Fraud, in fact, ranks first ahead of, respectively, theft of personal property, theft of household property, violent crime, vandalism, breaking and entering, and motor vehicle theft.
Expanding beyond the 12 months preceding the survey, one in six people (17% or 5.45 million people over the age of 15) said they had been the victim of fraud in the previous five years. This form of crime is on the rise, according to police data which indicates that the number of frauds has almost doubled in 10 years, going from just over 87,000 cases in 2011 to more than 168,000 in 2021.
However, Statistics Canada data lifts the veil on the shame that comes with being “caught” by fraudsters, as it shows that the police are only seeing the tip of the iceberg. Only one in ten (11%) who said they had been the victim of ESG fraud reported it to the police. “The rate of reporting fraud to the police thus approaches that of sexual assault (6%),” writes the federal agency.
It is in Saskatchewan (17%) and Quebec (15%) that victims contact the police the most.
However, we note that victims seek more to protect their money than to initiate an investigation, since two-thirds (65%) of victims of fraud had reported it to their financial institution.
Of note, most victims suffered no loss (38%) or a loss of less than $250 (16%). One in four victims lost about $1,000, but in 3% of cases the loss was at least $10,000, and 0.5% left more than $100,000. In total, the losses incurred by all victims of fraud exceed 16 billion in five years.
When looking at the data by region, we see that Alberta had the highest proportion of people who were victims of fraud (22%), while people living in Nunavut (8.6%), the Atlantic provinces and Quebec were the least likely to have experienced fraud, with rates varying between 13% and 14%.
Who are the main victims? Not surprisingly, high income is associated with an increased risk of being a victim of fraud; 13% of people with incomes under $20,000 were victims of fraud in the five years preceding the survey, compared to 24% of people with incomes of $120,000 or more.
Also, people with a university education were about 2.5 times more likely to report being victims of fraud than people without a high school diploma.
Unsurprisingly, police data tells us that the greatest number of frauds are done by computer (hacking, phishing, etc.) and that this trend is on the rise. Credit card fraud ranks second, but is on the decline, while securities or financial fraud, which is on the rise, ranks third. In almost all cases (90%) of reported fraud, personal information was obtained by the fraudsters.
