This occurs when a fraudster impersonates a senior person in the company instructing a staff member to either make an urgent payment or change payment details for an employee, contract, or supplier.

Fraudsters use sophisticated techniques such as hacking or spoofing software to access emails/systems and obtain key information. This helps to make the email request look as convincing as possible and hence will appear genuine to the receiver.

Fraudsters take time to build up knowledge about your business and the senior people within it to help improve the chances of their scam being a success. This could include scanning your website or any social media account (such as LinkedIn or Instagram) for details of genuine suppliers or employees that they can use to their advantage to make any email they send more credible.

What to look out for:

• Urgency for the payment to be made as fraudsters will apply pressure to ensure the request is completed ASAP to avoid detection
• Request is from a senior person in the company and someone that may not have made such requests previously or wouldn’t do so, hence it appears out of character
• The tone and style of the email is different from the person you usually receive this type of request from
• The person asks you to change the banking details of an existing supplier or employee
• The email address is one you don’t recognise
• The style and format of the email looks suspicious, check logos and email signatures

Top tips to reduce the risk of being a victim of CEO fraud:

• Confirm urgent payment requests directly with your colleague in person or over the phone using the details within your internal databases and not those on the email as they could be fake
• Be alert to unexpected emails or letters requesting urgent payment, even if it appears to be sent from someone within your business
• Consider the type of information you share online about your business/employees
• Educate all employees on the risks of CEO fraud
• Ensure employees feel comfortable approaching senior staff to verify payment requests
• Ensure all staff check for irregularities before processing payments and changing bank details and where possible ensure two people independently review the payment details
• Check your business’s bank statements carefully and report suspicious debits to SVB immediately
• If the payment request cannot be validated, then you should not proceed and report the matter to SVB as suspected fraud

If you believe you have been a victim of CEO fraud, please contact us immediately on our UK Client Services line 0800 023 1441 or +44 (020) 7367 7881 if calling outside the UK.