Wire Transfer Fraud Panel Offers Guidance, Advice to LVAIC Community

November 9, 2018, @ 8:00 AM

Panelists gather at the LVAIC Wire Transfer Fraud Seminar on Tuesday, October 30, 2018 at Moravian College to discuss fraud detection and prevention practices.

As part of the on-going efforts of LVAIC’s Cyber Security Awareness Month series, LVAIC hosted a Wire Transfer Fraud panel on Tuesday, October 30, 2018 at Moravian College. This professional development session offered an opportunity to learn from experts in the cyber security field regarding breaches in data, identity theft, best practices in preventing fraud, and steps to take if fraud occurs.

The panelists included moderator Jamie Busolits, Vice President of Payment Solutions Sales Consultant at BB&T Bank; Craig Sinnamon, Certified Fraud Examiner at Fulton Financial Corporation; Jolene Zimmerman, Vice President and Treasury Management Solutions Specialist at Fulton Financial Corporation; and Devanna Lugaro-Donofrio, Technical Product Consultant at BB&T Bank.

The panelist questions began with a simple discussion on the trends in prevalence in fraud, agreeing that the threat of fraud and identity theft is constant while the methods used to commit these crimes are continuously evolving. They cited such statistics as in 2013, 60% of businesses experienced fraud; in 2017, 74% of companies experienced successful or attempted check fraud, 48% experienced wire transfer fraud, and 78% of companies experienced fraud in general. There is no specific industry or market being targeted; this fraud occurs across all segments. While discussing the different segments of fraud, check fraud is the most common. However, LVAIC’s panelists explained that fraud still occurs around e-mail and phone calls.

With this trending rise in fraud, the panelists explained that the best way to prevent fraud is with education. Their banks offer numerous opportunities and seminars for individuals to learn more about the methods that hackers are using to commit fraud and what questions to ask when suspicious activities occur. Along these lines, they recommend practices that include making confirmation phone calls with institutions receiving payment if any details change on the account, such as address or account numbers. Further, among the LVAIC campuses, implementing anti-phishing software, creating multi-user steps in all payment processes, and promoting user awareness among all levels of the organization are the best-recommended courses of action around fraud prevention. The panelists also recommended performing an audit of all internal processes to discover fraud-prone gaps. Even after preventative training, these instances of fraud may still occur. For this reason, the panelists suggest an incident response plan following the steps of detection, communication, and eradication. When fraud does occur, the incident response plan among financial institutions includes freezing the client’s account, notifying police of the activity, contacting the information technology department, and creating a plan for mitigating future threats.

Among the financial institutions themselves, fraud prevention occurs with continually-evolving technology, ACH positive pay that requires banks to confirm every payment made via checks, changing internal controls, educating and testing employees on a regular basis, and more. They encourage consumers to utilize Trusteer Rapport software on personal devices and dual authentication. Simultaneously, banks are adding layer, such as voice biometrics in their call centers, behavior biometrics on their websites to track normal typing and clicking patterns, and one-time passcodes to verify identity.

The panelists explained that only 47% of businesses who experience fraud recognize that fraud has occurred within one week of the incident. The majority of businesses may not notice for months at a time. For this reason, they recommend on-campus training for the entire finance department, on-going training and education for new-hires, training for students, and maintaining active relationships with the financial institutions that serve them.

For more information on how BB&T Bank and Fulton Financial Corporation protect their clients, visit the BB&T Bank website and the Fulton Financial Corporation website directly.