Also known as Spoofing, bogus emails are sent to staff claiming to be from a senior member of staff within the organisation such as a Director, CEO or Chairman etc. requesting an urgent payment.
- They will often say that the payment is needed due to exceptional circumstances and needs to be carried out immediately.
- The email appears to be genuine as the fraudsters research the company details and locate the senior managers’ details; they then use this for the email address.
- They can either make an email address look like it is genuine or hack in to a users email account directly.
- Thinking it is a genuine request and often not wanting to question a senior director or CEO the employee completes the payment as instructed and the funds are withdrawn by the fraudster.