The Victimisation of Business: Indicators of Risk and the Direction of Future Research 1

Abstract

There has been comparatively little research on crime against businesses, although there is a growing amount of evidence that businesses are much more likely to suffer certain types of crime than households. This paper incorporates a review of recent surveys and reports on findings of a study of 2,618 businesses. The paper begins by discussing some ethodological issues and then discusses the findings on the levels of crime reported by business, and seeks to identify those finns most at risk. Overall, the paper concludes that crime against business is relatively high and that some businesses are disproportionately likely to suffer victimisation, not least those in the transport and retail sectors. Moreover, the survey findings suggest that the smallest businesses are common victims. Precisely because risk of crime differs, and the risk of victimisation from different offences varies, so there is a need to match type of crime prevention measures to type of risk. The findings suggest a need for much more focused research on how, where and why crime is concentrated on a few repeat victims.