48
June | 2023
Business
are pressured into quick action.
"Employees should be warned to
be alert for requests that come in
late on a Friday afternoon, at the
end of the month or anytime when
thieves think they can trick someone
into failing to properly verify a
transaction," Schaeff er advises.
Protect
Accounts
Good procedures can also guard
against a variation of social
engineering in which a caller,
pretending to be a customer, requests
bank routing numbers to pay an
invoice. "People are often happy to
give out such information because
they want to receive money," says
Schaeff er. "However, rather than
using the provided information
to wire funds into the account,
the thief wires funds out."
Businesses can obviate such wire
fraud by requiring that account
information be communicated only
by designated individuals who directly
dial the paying company using known
telephone numbers. "Another solution
is to establish one bank account
dedicated to wire transfers, and use
it only for inbound transactions,"
Schaeff er suggests.
In a reversal of the above fraud, a thief
pretending to be a vendor will send an
email providing routing numbers for a
new bank account where all
future payments are to be made.
e account, of course, belongs to
the thief. " is type of fraud is
exploding, and I cannot caution your
readers enough to be careful," says
Schaeff er. " You need to get to the right
person to verify that the request is
legitimate." Again, verifi cation should
be done over a voice line using a
known telephone number.
Schaeff er cautions that calling to
verify changes in bank accounts or
email addresses will work only if a
company's records are accurate.
"It's more important than ever to
enter valid contact information in
the master vendor fi le when it's fi rst
set up, and then update it regularly."
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