Biz Email Fraud Could Hit $1 Billion

Wire fraud perpetrated via business email compromises has quickly become a top concern for banking institutions. David Pollino, bank fraud prevention officer at Bank of the West, now predicts wire fraud losses in the U.S. linked to such "masquerading" schemes could exceed $1 billion this year.

In fact, the losses from these emerging schemes could be higher than any wire and ACH losses linked to account takeovers, he says.


"Traditionally, whether it was phishing or malware, you saw the criminals getting the username and password and then executing the transaction or takeover of the victim's computer to wage the attack," Pollino says. "With these new attacks, we see the actual compromise of the business. The victims are fooled into the legitimacy of the wire transfer." 

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