The Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway Commission (COSO) sponsored this research project to provide an extensive updated analysis of financial statement fraud occurrences. While the work of the National Commission on Fraudulent Financial Reporting in the mid-1980s identified numerous causal factors believed to contribute to financial statement fraud, little empirical evidence exists about factors related to instances of fraud since the release of the 1987 report (NCFFR, 1987). Thus, COSO commissioned this research project to provide COSO and others with information that can be used to guide future efforts to combat the problem of financial statement fraud and to provide a better understanding of financial statement fraud cases.