Recently, there has been a significant increase in the number of employers across the country who have been targeted by payroll fraudsters. Scammers continue to get more resourceful, cunning and technically savvy in their attempts to defraud victims by gaining access to financial accounts as well as valuable personal information.
Here is an outline of the most recent scheme and some tips on how to prevent your company and employees from falling victim to the perpetrators.
DIRECT DEPOSIT CHANGE REQUEST:
The owner or the person who is responsible for HR and/or processing payroll receives an email communication that seems to come from one of their staff. The email requests information on how to make a change to their direct deposit account and typically implies some sense of urgency. Typically, the sender seeks to inactivate the old direct deposit account and replace it with a completely new account. Here is an example of an email request along with some key identifiers to look for that are red flags for phishing and other fraudulent email scams: