The Booming Business of Fraud

As criminal activity evolves with technology, take steps to protect your company.

For businesses and their customers, the speed and ease of digital and electronic banking has never been better.

But with the tremendous convenience and efficiency come more opportunities for people who can cause your business financial harm. We’re talking about fraudsters, of course.

Because with each new advance in banking technology, banking fraud also evolves.

According to FBI statistics, in just 2022, $10.3B* in cyber fraud was reported. It’s likely even more missing funds went unreported.

With that kind of payday, fraudsters are going to keep looking for weak points. So it’s crucial for businesses to deploy strong protections.

Recognizing The Threats

Among the many departments at SouthState working to keep clients’ finances secure from fraudsters is the Fraud Investigative Unit (FIU). Here, numerous teams work constantly to prevent and detect all forms of banking fraud.

“What we’re seeing is a lot of new spin on old methods,” says Wes Duncan, Manager of Risk and Fraud Mitigation in SouthState’s FIU.

Duncan says stolen checks are on the rise. While criminals are using old-school methods to pilfer checks, like breaking into postal boxes, they’re now selling the checks or account information on the dark web, along with scamming tutorials.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is also an emerging threat. Along with fraudsters creating deep fakes and voice cloning, Duncan says, “there’s a dark version of ChatGPT that helps make phishing emails more convincing.”

With all the looming dangers, what can businesses do?

First and foremost, practice prevention.

While Duncan notes that some industries may be more of a target than others, he says the most risk-prone organizations, “are the ones that think fraud won’t happen to them.”
 

To keep fraudsters at bay, start by defending your network from viruses and phishing attempts. Installing protection, like a strong firewall, antivirus software and spam filter, “will pay off in ways you don’t even realize,” says Duncan. After all, employees can’t fall prey to sophisticated emails if they don’t get through.

For financial transactions, keeping a watchful eye is crucial. According to Duncan, “we’re seeing a shift in technique from attempting a single, large dollar transaction, to low dollar high-volume transactions, in hopes they go undetected for a longer period of time.”

Duncan recommends reconciling your accounts as often as possible and employing dual control for all payments. Dual control means payments are created by one person and authorized by another. Both precautions help prevent internal and external fraud.

Opt-in For More Security

Just by banking with SouthState, all our business customers have high-level protections built in, like our fraud monitoring processes and multi-factor authentication. But there are extra layers of defense that businesses should consider adding. These tools not only add security but also improve efficiency.
 

Automated Clearing House (ACH)

Receiving and making payments, including payroll, through the ACH automates the process and eliminates the need for paper checks, creating more efficiency and security.
 

Positive Pay

One of the best fraud defenses available, Positive Pay automatically checks all payments made against a client-provided list. Payments are checked by check number, amount and payee. Clients are alerted for payments that don’t match any criteria or go above a specified dollar amount
 

Treasury Navigator®

SouthState's Treasury Navigator gives you even more control over your business finances by helping you oversee and manage all transactions and funds from one platform. With a secure browser and multi-factor identification, you’ll have strong built-in fraud protection. And there’s a secure app so you can approve payments and assign tasks from anywhere.

Please contact your banker to sign up for any of these services or learn more about SouthState's risk management solutions.

  * Federal Bureau of Investigation's 2022 Internet Crime Report