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A whistleblower has to feel safe in order to have the courage to start shining the light on problem areas in an organization. An EU directive soon to come into force imposes specific requirements on companies to ensure that those who point out problems would not end up like martyrs.

Video surveillance is used on streets, vehicles, shops, offices – pretty much everywhere. Whenever anyone leaves home – and as soon as they close the door behind them – they can wind up on someone else’s camera footage. Even when hiking in the woods, it’s possible to be captured by a wildlife camera.

The law transposes the EU directive into Estonian law and entails an obligation for organizations to create internal and external reporting channels for reporting internal misconduct. The infringements that whistleblowers can report are very different - breaches of procurement procedures, internal fraud, breaches of environmental requirements, and so on.

The Danish tax authority increased the taxable income of Tetra Pak Processing Systems A/S due to shortcomings in transfer pricing documentation and continuous losses. The Danish Supreme Court reached the conclusion that the transfer pricing documentation filed by the company did not meet the requirements as the documentation lacked a competent comparability analysis.

Under the Occupational Health and Safety Act, employers must compile a risk assessment of the working environment. It is mandatory for employers who have at least one employee (security institutions excluded).

Maintaining proper accounting on transfer prices and documenting the reasoning for conformity to market value is in the interests of every enterprise, as it avoids tax risks. In preparing documentation, the requirements of legal acts should be considered along with the specific company’s risks and needs.

The sudden surge in remote working, online shopping, digital health and virtual learning boosted demand for business technology and communications solutions. At first glance, the future of technology companies may seem cloudless, but in fact, many of them predict that customer orders will decrease in the future. Find out, what challenges the technology sector is facing in the near future:

Grant Thornton Baltic conducted a survey among companies to find out how many of them are consciously and purposefully engaged in anti-money laundering. Look into the results and test your company!

In certain cases, companies have an obligation to appoint a data protection officer. This obligation applies both to companies that process data themselves and to companies that process data from other companies. The data protection officer must also be recruited or outsourced by public authorities.

In January WhatsApp announced that it is changing its data policies so that the users only options are either to agree to their data policy and make data about them available to Facebook, the owner of WhatsApp, and any of its chosen third parties or not use the service. Grant Thornton Baltic's Head of Data Protection and Cybersecurity Maili Torma opens up the subject.

Cookies can't read data off your hard drive or cookie files created by other sites; they are one of the technologies tracking people’s behavior on the web.

In addition to the pandemic the 2020 is memorable as the year or record growth in cybercrime. According to the FBI the USA companies have reported a 400% growth in cyber-attacks and 68% more companies reported of fraud.

Most companies view an IT audit as an expense, but experts say in reality, it helps companies to save money – especially if it’s conducted at the right time. An IT audit is a possibility to obtain an external view of the information system in current use.

Every entrepreneur, as well as an individual, can be involved in money laundering, even without knowing or realizing it themselves, according to Äripäev's radio program "Kasvukursil". Read about hot topics in money laundering.

Experience has shown that not all creditors analyze the creditworthiness of consumers as they should, control activities sometimes remain superficial and therefore do not serve the purpose – ensuring that the borrower is able to repay the loan under the terms agreed. Merili Kiipus, Grant Thornton Baltic's Business Risk Analyst investigates further.

In a crisis, the internal control system must remain a priority. In order not to find yourself fighting the consequences of corruption and fraud after a crisis situation, it is worth knowing what the company's so-called Three Lines of Defense are. Read more from the article by Tuulikki Uluots, Grant Thornton Baltic's adviser of business risk services.