Fraudsters hack emails

High-tech fraud can strike anywhere at anytime.  This story is interesting as the criminals are targeting property buyers and sellers.

A real estate fraud in which a young British couple lost their $90,000 home deposit serves as a timely reminder to ensure the security of all communications between law firms and clients.

The fraud, as reported by a media outlet,  was perpetrated on two newlyweds who received an email which appeared to come from their solicitors.  The email stated that the bank account in which the buyers were to transfer their money had changed.

The buyers followed the instruction, only to learn that the email was a fake, presumably sent by fraudsters who had accessed email correspondence between the couple and the solicitors by hacking into either party’s email account.

With universal reliance on email communication, you need to be aware of the potential for this kind of criminal activity.  Whilst fraud can be perpetrated in unlimited ways, in relation to this particular fraud, it is worth noting that law firms rarely change their trust account.   We have never changed our trust account.