Corporations can be fined by governments and civil courts and have often found themselves owing some eye-watering sums, especially since the financial crisis of 2008 saw big businesses come under increased scrutiny.

In fact, corporate fines can sometimes reach into billions of dollars for the biggest breaches, which can add up over the years if a company finds itself in hot water multiple times. We’ve taken a look at which businesses have been fined the most over the last two decades, as well as the most commonly fined industries and offenses leading to fines.

The penalty totals below are adjusted to account for the fact that each parent's entries may include both agency records and settlement announcements for the same case; or else a penalty covering multiple locations may be listed in the individual records for each of the facilities.

They are also adjusted to reflect cases in which federal and state or local agencies cooperated and issued separate announcements of the outcome.

Details here