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Network Link Analysis

Definition

A technique that represents entities (vendors, employees, bank accounts, addresses) as nodes in a graph and shared attributes as edges, enabling investigators to visualise hidden relationships across large datasets that are invisible in tabular form.

Field
Fraud data analytics
Nodes
Vendors, employees, bank accounts, addresses
Edges
Shared attributes
Purpose
Visualise hidden relationships across large datasets

Common questions

How does network link analysis complement continuous monitoring?+

Continuous monitoring flags individual anomalous transactions, while link analysis reveals whether the flagged parties are connected in ways suggesting coordinated fraud.

What is a common red flag in vendor-employee link analysis?+

A shared address, phone number, or bank account between an employee and a vendor, suggesting a fictitious vendor or a hidden self-dealing relationship.

Related terms

ACL / Galvanize HighBond
A purpose-built audit analytics platform (originally Audit Command Language) that imports financial data, executes statistical and rule-based tests, and produces exception reports...
Benford's Law
An empirical regularity in naturally occurring numerical datasets: the leading digit follows a logarithmic distribution, with 1 appearing about 30% of the...
Continuous Monitoring
An automated control framework that applies fraud indicator tests to transactions as they are processed or on a frequent scheduled basis, generating...
Fuzzy Matching
A string-comparison technique that identifies near-identical records by measuring edit distance or phonetic similarity rather than requiring character-exact matches. Used in duplicate...
IDEA
Interactive Data Extraction and Analysis: an audit data analytics tool that supports Benford analysis, duplicate detection, stratification, and custom query filters across...

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