"My father used to always say to me that, you know, if a guy goes out to steal a loaf of bread to feed his family, they'll give him 10 years, but a guy can do white-collar crime and steal the money of thousands and he'll get probation and a slap on the wrist" - Jesse Venture.
It was in the late 1930s that Edwin H. Sutherland took upon the responsibility of transforming the criminological theory. During that time all the discussions regarding crime revolved around the poor. It was during that time that he coined the term white-collar crime.
He defined white-collar crime as a crime committed by a person of respectability and high social status in the course of his occupation (Sutherland 1949, 1) The Oxford English Dictionary defines the white-collar criminals as a person who takes advantage of the special knowledge or responsibility of his position to commit non-violent, often financial, crimes.
They are often associated with business rather than an individual. The most common white-collar crimes prevalent in today's time are espionage, embezzlement, antitrust violations, bankruptcy fraud, money laundering, etc. These are non-violent crimes but are a huge threat to society. Although a victimless crime, white-collar crimes are widely acknowledged to cause financial, physical, and social harm. There are no exact statistics that can provide the detail as to how much losses are suffered due to white-collar crime but it's way more than street crime.
Types of White-Collar Crimes
There are two ways to approach the concept of white-collar crime. They are offender based and offense-based. (Wen 2013) The former is defined as a type of crime committed by a person of respectability and high social status. Offender based definition focuses more on the characteristics of the actor rather than the characteristics of the crime. The definition of offense-based crimes was given by Herbert Edelhertz in the early 1970s He defined white-collar crime as an illegal act or series of illegal acts committed by non-physical means and by concealment or guile to obtain business or to obtain personal advantage (Edelhertz, 1970).
Bank fraud:
Bank fraud arises when someone uses illegal activities to obtain money from a bank or other financial institution. It is different from a bank robbery. In bank fraud, the fraud is kept a secret in the hope that nobody ever finds out. Bank fraud can be done through bank impersonation, stolen checks, forgery, fraudulent loans, internet fraud, etc.
Blackmail:
Blackmail is a type of fraud in which the other person is threatened to gain something of value. This gain doesn't necessarily mean something of monetary value but can also be sexual favors. The threat can be of revealing embarrassing pictures of someone or damaging information about some person. It is not a crime to reveal the information but using the information to gain something.
Bribery:
Bribery is to try to make someone do something for you by giving them money, presents, or something else that they want. Acceptance bribe is not necessary for the offense of bribe to be committed. (Dictionary 2017)
Computer Fraud:
Computer frauds are those types of fraud which include stealing money from any person through hacking.
Embezzlement:
When one person is entrusted with someone else's funds and he misappropriates them. It is termed as embezzlement.
Extortion:
Extortion is when somebody obtains something from someone, generally money, through threatened or actual force, it is termed as extortion.
Money Laundering:
When one hides the source from where money was obtained, it is then called money laundering.
Tax Fraud:
It is escaping from paying the taxes by showing false information to the concerned authority
Source:http://www.legalserviceindia.com/legal/article-3811-white-collar-crimes.html