One of the most recent threats to corporations is a targeted business scam known as Invoice Manipulation. Cyber thieves, known as hackers, are increasing their attacks on businesses every day. Invoice manipulation is where an employee of the company is tricked into voluntarily parting with money, products, services, or goods. This is usually done via a hack or phishing scam. A customer or vendor appears to legitimately ask an employee of the target company to alter an invoice either by changing the amount or the delivery address.
This can happen in a variety of ways but usually happens when through a phishing scam or gaining access to an employee’s work password, the criminal can access the business account. This can all take time but the hacker has the time to wait; watching your activity, reading emails, and learning about the interaction between your company and its’ vendors.
Once the criminal learns enough, it is simply a matter of redirecting payments to a different bank through Wire, ACH, check or have deliveries go to a new address. After posting these instructions, they can be deleted so that there is no history.
The worst part of this scenario is that the company is totally unaware that anything has happened until a follow-up order or inquiry is made. At this point, it is too late to rectify the situation as the money and/or goods are long gone.
Invoice Scam Misconceptions
Invoice manipulation is not about your employee giving up money, products, services, or goods. It’s more about an outsider portraying themselves as your employee and then convincing your customers or vendors to redirect payment or products.
Since your customer or vendor has a communication that came from your company about an actual payment or goods intended to be from you, it is your company’s problem to fix. In reality, if the information or message came from your computer server, your customer or vendor is not responsible for your loss.
Companies hit by this nefarious action often feel that since they haven’t done anything wrong, however, after an investigation, it is usually discovered that they were hacked or a victim of phishing and therefore the problem started with them and their lack of IT security.
How Do I Protect My Business from Invoice Manipulation?
Cybercriminals are getting smarter every day! Contact a 10X Consulting Group team member at 704-931-1056 or visit us online at https://10xcg.com/and let us help you review your IT security to ensure your company is protected against invoice manipulation scams and more!