Police are investigating a new case of online fraud involving the theft of a large sum of money. By sending a fraudulent email, the perpetrators managed to embezzle more than 38,000 euros.
The case was reported today to the Larnaca Cybercrime Unit by the manager of a company in Larnaca. According to the report, the perpetrators of the fraud, after illegally accessing the company’s email —e-mail—of the company, sent an e-mail that appeared to have been sent by a partner company. The fraudulent message requested payment of 38,650 euros in connection with a previous commercial transaction between the two companies.
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Following the instructions provided in the message it had received, the complainant company proceeded to pay the amount via wire transfer to a bank account, the details of which were provided in the message. Later, upon communicating with the company’s associate, it was determined that the message had been sent by fraudsters and that the bank account to which the transfer was made does not belong to the partner company.
The Financial Crimes Investigation Office of the Larnaca CID is investigating the case.
In light of this new fraud case, the Police recommend that, in cases where such messages are received requesting payment of sums of money, citizens verify the messages by contacting the recipients to whom the payment is to be made via telephone. For this communication, a phone number should be used that the two parties have previously used to contact each other or that is listed in messages exchanged between them during previous transactions.
Company owners or managers are urged to inform their staff about this specific type of fraud and to implement procedures to verify the payment requests they receive.
More information on this type of fraud, also known as invoice fraud, as well as tips on how the public can avoid falling victim to it, is available on the Police website HERE
