Cybercrime – “Friday afternoon fraud”– how to safeguard against property fraud by Pritpal Chahal
A new wave of cybercrime is targeting residential conveyancing transactions. Fraudsters are aggressively targeting law firms that handle property transactions due to the large sums of money involved. The SRA have reported that in the past 12 months, three quarters of cybercrime have been a type of “Friday afternoon” fraud. Friday’s are the most popular days for completions and it also buys the fraudster time over the weekend before the crime is detected. Fraudsters are intercepting emails and either posing as solicitors or clients. They then send false bank details so money is transferred into the criminals account.
Examples of Friday afternoon fraud
A recent case of Friday afternoon fraud saw charity worker Howard Mollett lose his life savings. Fraudsters hacked into emails sent between Mr Mollett and his conveyancing solicitor. The fraudsters contacted Mr Mollett at the final stages of the transaction and sent him an email using an email address belonging to a member of staff at the firm of solicitors. The email requested Mr Mollett to transfer balance of completion funds into another bank account, fraudulently advising that the usual bank account was unable to receive CHAPs or Bacs payments. As a result, Mr Mollett lost £67,000.00. Unfortunately, there have been many similar cases such as this:
Daily Telegraph article – I lost £137,000 in a conveyancing scam
Another case saw a conveyancing solicitor transfer sale proceeds to fraudsters. Mr and Mrs Lupton sent bank account details to their solicitors firm after being requested to do so. The email from Mr and Mrs Lupton was intercepted by fraudsters. As a result, the sale proceeds were sent to the fraudster’s bank account. It was only a few days later, that Mr and Mrs Lupton realised that they had not received their sale proceeds. They lost £333,000.00.
Daily Telegraph article – Fraudsters hacked emails to my solicitor and stole £340,000
Safeguards
- Always take care if giving bank details over email or avoid altogether if at all possible.
- If bank details are given over email then this should ideally be verified by two methods: – over the phone and in person.
- We will never change our bank details.
- Always, call your solicitor by telephone to double-check their bank details. At Askews Legal LLP we always call our clients before concluding the property transaction to double-check client’s bank account details.
- Be safe – Transfer a small amount i.e. £1-£10 to your solicitors account first and then call the conveyancing solicitor to check that this has been received.
If you have any queries about Cybercrime and/or residential conveyancing in general, please contact Sunitum Dhillon or Pritpal Chahal Solicitor and Practice Manager on 02476 231000.
Askews Legal LLP – Solicitors Coventry.
