I’m repurposing the initialism ‘TL: DR’ to mean ‘Too Long: Did Read’. I have been writing industry reports since 2015 and reading them far longer, which gives me a wealth of experience to assess the content of industry reports so you don’t have to.

I’m kicking off this series with the PwC’s Global Economic Crime and Fraud Survey 2022. I found this report while reading Lori MacVittie’s monthly newsletter, The Tech Menagerie. As my friends in Boston would say, Lori is ‘wicked smaht’ and someone you should follow. Note: none of my friends actually talk like that unless they’re making fun of their own home town.

Overall impression – This not a cybersecurity report, it’s a report for CFOs, CMOs, and other executives looking for information about fraud in the industry. It’s worth reading for a security professional because it reflects the concerns those executives are worried about. Survey data is one of my least favorite ways to build a report, but PwC is correct in framing this as opinions, rather than facts.

My key takeaway from the report is the rising concern about hackers and cybercrime among executives across all industries. My key complaint is the lack of analysis in the report. ‘Here’s the data’ is different from ‘Here’s what the data means.’ I’d give this report a solid B, which could have been an A with additional analysis.

The Good – This is a short and very pretty report, which makes it both readable and easy to consume. There are multiple graphics in the report that can be used in a presentation to highlight specific topics. The ‘Type of fraud experienced, by industry’ image on page 6 could easily be used when talking to any number of industries to show how they compare to other industries. Similarly, the ‘Type of external perpetrator’ bar chart on page 9 could be used in many presentations.

The report has two ‘In Focus’ sections, the first on page 6, a second on page 9, which contain the most analysis in the report. Rather than rephrase the plots in writing, both sections give additional insight into what the data means. If you only have a couple of minutes to spare, read these sections first.

A personal concern of mine has long been to have both a methodology and a credit section, and this report has both. Sort of. There is a brief ‘About the survey’ on page 13, appropriately sized for this report. I’d like more details on the survey, but most readers wouldn’t be well served by such content. I’m not sure if the Contacts on page 14 is the same as a credits page, but it does give the reader someone to reach out to for more information.

The Bad – My primary concern with this report is, once again, the lack of significant analysis in the majority of the report. The worst example is page 5, which provides a bump out that’s disconnected from the majority of text and a plot that’s useful but devoid of any explanation or analysis.

The title of the report is misleading, and the concept of a perimeter doesn’t enter the text until page 8. Even then, the perimeter is poorly defined. Some of this is because the target audience isn’t security professionals, but neither the data nor the analysis demonstrates a strong connection to this title.

The color scheme is interesting, with a mixture of reds, oranges, and greys. Making plots and graphics accessible to readers who are color blind or color deficient is too often overlooked when developing reports. I suspect anyone who is red-green color blind will have difficulty differentiating the data points in some of these plots. The good news is that the majority of these plots are simple enough to be read without color being a major issue.

Conclusion – PwC’s Global Economic Crime and Fraud Survey 2022 is worth downloading and spending 30 minutes with because it gives insight into what business leaders are thinking about. It doesn’t draw many conclusions about the data or provide any earth-shaking conclusions, but it does give most readers decent data points to create their own analysis from. I just wish the content could have fit the title better.