ABSTRACT
Criminal opportunities are now recognized as an important cause of all crime, because without an opportunity, there cannot be a crime. In the past few decades, the study of crime has increasingly focused on the situational and ecological factors that create or facilitate opportunities for street crime. In regard to white-collar crime, lure and the credibility of oversight may be the most appropriate ways to conceptualize criminal opportunities, because white-collar crimes almost always represent perversions of legitimate economic activities. Criminal opportunities are exploited through the use of particular techniques. That is, in order to take advantage of a criminal opportunity, the offender often has to know how to use a particular technique. Unlike ordinary street criminals, white-collar offenders often do not have to come into direct contact with their victims. The physical actions of white-collar offenders almost always have the superficial appearance of legitimacy.
