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Resources on Corruption
This database is maintained by the Global Investigative Journalism Network (GIJN) and is one of many resources available at our Resource Center.
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Source | Item Type | Description | URL |
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GIJN's Global Guide to Investigating Organized Crime | Reporting Guide | Leading crime reporters (and one professor) offer their hard-won advice about how to tackle these complex — and dangerous — topics. We've chosen nine key areas: criminal finance, narcotics, arms trade, environmental crime, forced disappearances, cybercrime, mafia states, human trafficking, and art and antiquities. | Reporting Guide |
Investigative Dashboard by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) | Databases; Experts | OCCRP's Investigative Dashboard includes software tools and databases useful for researching and mapping individuals and companies. Its ID Search indexes more than two million documents on Politically Exposed Persons. Links to external databases include business registries, regional procurement registries, regulatory agencies, commercial registries and court registries around the world. Experts are available to assist with research. | Databases |
Offshore Leaks Database by International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) | Database | ICIJ has compiled a database of corporate information based on leaked documents on nearly 810,000 offshore companies and trusts from the Pandora Papers, Paradise Papers, Bahamas Leaks, Panama Papers and Offshore Leaks investigations. The database can be searched by people, companies, and addresses connected to offshore entities and country, or by jurisdiction. | Database |
OpenCorporates | Database | The UK-based company Chrinon Ltd operated OpenCorporates. In early 2024 it had nearly 223 million companies from more than 140 jurisdictions. The information is sourced from national business registries and linked/matched by association. The database is searchable by company, officer, and jurisdiction. | Database |
Transparency International | Information; Databases; Expert Sources; Case Studies; Toolkit | The anti-corruption NGO is active in nearly 100 countries and publishes the annual Corruption Perceptions Index, which measures levels of perceived public sector corruption in 180 countries around the world, providing details for indicators at country level and ranking countries based on those indicators. TI also publishes the Global Corruption Barometer, which is updated periodically. It also provides a toolkit for journalists that want to investigate corruption: https://www.transparency.org/en/toolkits/media. The Knowledge Hub includes TI research output and is home to the Anti-Corruption Helpdesk and TI's expert network: research. https://knowledgehub.transparency.org/ | Databases |
Global Financial Integrity (GFI) | Information; Datasets; Expert Sources; Reports | The Washington-based nonprofit conducts original analysis of "illicit financial flows, corruption, illicit trade, and money laundering. Through high-caliber analyses, fact-based advocacy to promote beneficial ownership and a cloud-based database to curtail trade fraud, GFI aims to address the harms inflicted by trade misinvoicing, transnational crime, tax evasion and kleptocracy." | Datasets |
Data on Corruption by the World Bank | Datasets | The World Bank Group Enterprise Survey provides indicators of the prevalence of different types of bribery in 159 economies, based on surveys of more than 219,000 firms. Database query tool available; graphs can be generated to compare countries. A database query tool is available to help you better understand the prevalence of corruption across various firm subgroups. You can also generate graphs to compare countries. | Datasets |
Global Infrastructure Anti-Corruption Centre - Project Anti-Corruption System (PACS) | Information | The UK-based international non-profit focuses on corruption in infrastructure, construction and engineering sectors and provides resources (including the PACS, the Project Anti-Corruption System, and specific measures) for governments, organizations, funders, project owners, and institutions/associations to understand, identify, and prevent corruption. National affiliates are located in Colombia, Germany, Italy, Tunisia, South Africa, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. | Information |
International Anti-Corruption Resource Center | Guide & Training Tool. Information; Expert Sources | The guide provides detailed information and steps on detecting corruption and fraud in development projects and addresses bribery, bid rigging, collusive bidding, and fraud. A training tool designed for analysts and investigators reviewing bids is also available. List of "red flags" available. | Guide & Training Tool |
U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre | Information; Expert Sources | The Norway-based organization offers a resource center of anti-corruption material and a help desk for questions. Basic services, development cooperation, evaluation and measurement, health, informal contexts, international drivers of corruption, justice sector, migration, natural resources and energy, "oil, gas, and mining," people's engagement, private sector, public financial management, and renewable resources. | Information |
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) | Country Profiles and Information | Country profiles, including status of ratification of the Convention Against Corruption, country evaluation reports and relevant links to country information in related UN anti-corruption platforms and databases. "Track" database on national laws: http://www.track.unodc.org/Pages/home.aspx | Country Profiles |
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) | Country Reports | Offers country monitoring reports on the implementation of the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention | Country Reports |
Stolen Asset Recovery Initiative (StAR) | Database | StAR Asset Recovery Watch is a public database that tracks efforts by prosecution authorities worldwide to go after assets that stem from corruption. The objective of StAR Asset Recovery Watch is to collect and systematize information about completed and ongoing recovery efforts of proceeds of corruption that have an international dimension. | Databases |
U.S. Department of State, Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs | Reports | US State Department's country-by-country two volume report describing efforts to combat all aspects of the international drug trade, chemical control, money laundering, and financial crimes. | Reports |
Group of States against Corruption (GRECO) by the Council of Europe | Reports, factsheets | GRECO was established by the Council of Europe to monitor its 49 member states’ compliance with the organization’s anti-corruption standards. Includes reports, fact sheets, etc., on member countries. | Reports |
Overseas Business Risk by the Foreign & Commonwealth Office and UK Trade & Investment | Information | UK Overseas Business Risk service offers guides, geopolitical, and economic analysis on overseas markets to exporters, including guides to potential risks such as human rights issues, bribery and corruption, terrorism, criminal activity, and intellectual property. | Information |
Basel Anti-Money Laundering Index by the The Basel Institute | Datasets | The Switzerland-based nonprofit organization focuses on international banking standards and compliance and has created the ranking index based on the risk of factors such as money laundering, terrorist financing, financial/public transparency, and judicial strength for 152 jurisdictions. | Datasets |
TRACE Compendium | Database | The TRACE Compendium is a "searchable database of summaries of international anti-bribery enforcement actions. Most actions included in the TRACE Compendium are Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”) enforcement actions brought by the U.S. Department of Justice and/or the US Securities and Exchange Commission, but also includes growing number of international anti-bribery enforcement actions brought by enforcement authorities outside of the US, particularly amongst signatories to the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention." | Database |
UNCA Civil Society Coalition | Sources | The coalition's list of 350 members from more than 100 countries that are civil society anti-corruption organizations can be used to find sources within a country or region. | Sources |
Public Access to Court Electronic Records (PACER) | Database | An electronic public access service that allows users to obtain case and docket information online from US federal appellate, district, and bankruptcy courts, and the PACER Case Locator. | Database |
Marine Traffic | Database | Search the MarineTraffic ships database of thousands of active and decommissioned vessels. Find locations of ports and ships using the near Real Time ships map. | Database |
The Global Anticorruption Blog | Resources | Long list of organizations, also list of blogs on the topic. | Resources |
Investigating Land and Corruption in Africa - A Training Manual For Journalists by Transparency International | News | A training manual supports journalists in Africa to investigate and report stories of land corruption. Lots of other publications also included in this link https://www.transparency.org/publications | News |
Curbing Corruption | Resources | A website "providing practical help for public officials and politicians planning anti-corruption reforms." See the analysis and diagnosis section for suggestions of the kinds of corruption that occur. | Resources |
GIJN's Guide to Investigating Organized Crime in Africa: Kleptocracies | Tips & Tools | Kleptocracy is government by theft. The Cambridge English Dictionary defines it as “a society whose leaders make themselves rich and powerful by stealing from the rest of the people.” This GIJN chapter offers tips and tools on investigating kleptocracy in Africa. | Tips & Tools |
Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime (GITOC) | Resources | Multiple reports on Arms Trafficking, Cybercrime, Development, Drug Trafficking, Financial Crime, Governance and corruption. | Resources |
Inter-American Development Bank | Reports | A series of published reports on corporate, police, political, transparency, and anticorruption. | Reports |
Globalization and Health | Academic Essay | Exploring anti-corruption, transparency, and accountability in the World Health Organization, the United Nations Development Programme, the World Bank Group, and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. | Academic Essay |
Africa Anti-Corruption Platform | Resources | This Anti-Corruption Platform for Sub-Saharan Africa provides a platform to showcase civil society organizations working on anti-corruption, in particular through activities around UN Convention against Corruption (UNCAC) and its review process. | Resources |
GIJN's 10 Steps for Fighting Kleptocracy | Resource | With democratic progress at stake globally, Stanford scholar Larry Diamond gives a 10-step program to fight kleptocracy, including a call for increased support of investigative journalism. | Resource |