Protecting a Business from Fraud Losses

The 2024 Association for Financial Professionals (AFP) Payments Fraud and Control Survey reported that 80% of organizations surveyed were victims of payments fraud attacks or attempts in 2023. This number reflects a 15-percentage point increase in payments fraud over the prior year and the highest rate reported since 2018. The 2024 AFP Payments Fraud and Control Survey was conducted in January 2024 and received responses from 522 corporate practitioners representing organizations of varying sizes and a broad range of industries.

Key survey highlights:

In 2023, the most common source of payments fraud was an external source or individual (e.g., forged check, stolen card, corporate synthetic identity fraud). 65% of financial professionals report that payments fraud at their companies was the result of actions by an individual outside the organization.

Of those who were victims of payments fraud in 2023, 30% of organizations were unsuccessful in recovering funds lost to fraud.
 

What you can do to combat fraud:

• Login to online banking or mobile banking daily to monitor activity. Control your account activity.
• Understand and manage your online users’ access rights. There are various access rights options. Not all users require the same access level.
• Reduce checks issued by utilizing ACH origination payment solution. Control your payments without giving out your account information.
• Utilize Dual Control for Payments functions. This is an important guardrail when disbursing payments.
• Document and periodically review your Payments solutions limits. ACH/Wire origination, Credit Cards, Debit Cards.
• Engage an IT provider to test and monitor the health of your network security.
• Reach out to your insurance provider. Are you truly covered? Have you considered Social Engineering insurance?
• Enroll your accounts in Positive Pay and use the tool to protect your business. Mitigate check and ACH debit fraud risk at the point of presentment.