Tips to help your business avoid holiday scams

Help protect your business from fraud this holiday season

The holiday season brings increased fraud activity, making it critical to review potential threats to your business information and accounts. As business pressures rise, criminals seize the opportunity to trick business owners and employees into sharing critical information or making payments.
 

Three common fraud scenarios that increase during the holidays.

1. Business email compromise (BEC)

Fraudsters impersonate or hack a company executive email address and send an email to authorized employees or vendors with a request to change payment information. The email appears legitimate, uses the executive's name and tone, and may create a sense of urgency by claiming a critical business opportunity or penalty is at stake due to the holiday rush or year-end deadlines.

2. Deepfakes in customer support

Scammers leverage deepfake technology to convincingly impersonate a vendor during a call to a company’s accounts payable team. They falsely claim that a payment for holiday merchandise hasn't been received and demand immediate payment, threatening to withhold the merchandise otherwise. Unfortunately, the accounts payable representative, believing the call to be legitimate, promptly sends the payment to the fraudster.

3. Spoofing during sales

Fraudsters create fake websites or email addresses that closely resemble those of legitimate businesses and use them to offer fake holiday deals or discounts. Unsuspecting customers might enter their sign-on credentials or credit card information, compromising their sensitive data.

Protective measures checklist

• Monitor accounts and transactions closely, especially during peak seasons.
• Sign up for Account Alerts to help ensure you’ll be notified of suspicious transactions or activity.
• Stay informed about the latest fraud tactics and trends.
• Implement robust email security measures, including multi-factor authentication.
• Verify requests to change payment instructions by contacting the organization directly using a known and trusted phone number or other contact method.
• Educate employees on recognizing and reporting suspicious activity. Fraudulent communications often contain errors in spelling, grammar, or punctuation or may contain a sense of urgency.
• Keep software and security systems up to date.
• Be cautious before opening links and attachments or scanning QR codes from unknown sources.
• Consider implementing additional security measures for high-value transactions.

Don’t let fraudsters steal your joy this holiday season.

With a little preparation and added care, you can help protect your business from fraud this holiday season.

To learn more about KeyBank’s fraud resources, contact your payment advisor or relationship manager or visit key.com/businessfraud.