Verona, 20 April 2024 – They simulate online the identity of the head of the company and send a request to the accounting department to pay a 1 million euro invoice. A payment that was about to be made until the real CEO noticed the anomaly and reported the attempted deception. So the Verona postal police foiled a million euro scam attempted online against a Veronese company.
The scam
According to what has been learned, there were scammers included in the company’s organizational chart and posing as the CEO they sent to the accounting office the request for payment of a one million euro invoice to a foreign current account and different from those with which one usually operated. The company’s accounting department staff was in fact convinced to talk to the CEObut, upon verification, the latter denied any intervention and it was addressed to the postal police.
Police intervention
The agents of the Veronese postal police have activated, through the Central Service, the international channels of police cooperation through the Financial Intelligence Unit of the Bank of Italy, managing to to block the transaction e returning the large sum of money before the actual transfer to foreign accounts. This type of scam, in which the role of the CEO emerges, is among the most dangerous cyber attacks for companies, which can cause not only economic but also reputational damage to the companies and managers involved. In the last period there have been various cases in the Veneto, the latest being a Godega company in Sant’Urbano (Treviso) already affected in recent months.
