Scammers have started forging accounts of partners of different companies in an attempt to scam Latvian businesses of their money, reports Swedbank, warning companies and their accountants to be especially careful with paperwork and transactions.
Often scammers succeed in imitating e-mail addresses and replacing payment details. This is why employees of companies responsible for paperwork and transactions are sometimes tricked into sending money to accounts of other financial institutions.
The average amount companies lose to such scams has reached EUR 100 000 this year.
«Mutual trust is normal between business partners. However, if a partner sends a letter detailing a change in the company’s payment details, it would be best to double check. This is especially true for December, when companies are busy covering the remaining bills to complete their respective financial years,» warns Swedbank Head of the Corporate Customer Division Jevgenijs Ivanovs.
This scam method is rather complex, however, as it requires scammers to collect very specific information. They can acquire this information if company employees do not pay enough attention towards information security or use software that can be accessed remotely or otherwise be manipulated. Once scammers gain access to correspondence of companies and their business partners, forging documents becomes easy. For example, the argument for the change of payment details may be used can be used in the form of an unplanned audit with a request to transfer payment to a different account. Another way it can be communicated is in the form of a sudden announcement regarding the change of a bank.
To make it harder for scams to succeed, it is recommended to adopt a four-eyes approach: have another colleague join the payment and general money transfer operations. This approach is useful if scammers attempt to use emotional pressure in fake e-mails, demanding immediate action and faking urgency for payments. Scammers often use employees’ emotional worries or carelessness. This is why having one more employee can help notice details and help keep their company’s finances safe.