What happens at the individual level can happen at a much higher, corporate level, too. A smart scammer may not exactly send a corporate entity the kind for mail described above, but could devise different ways of enticing people to part with sensitive business information. A scammer can impugn the emails of the MD or CEO of a company and ask Finance or other departments to part with highly important information by sending out a mail from these email ids. Just like how an infection can still happen with all the care in world; a scam can happen in companies with the most secure and fortified systems.
Disastrous consequences
Once some sensitive information gets leaked online, the consequences can be simply anything, from loss of business to loss of reputation. Once a scammer gets access to privileged information about the company, he can do just anything from infecting the systems to demanding ransom for allowing access to blocked files.
While smaller organizations are prone to be vulnerable to scams worldwide; the recent WannaCry ransomware attack showed that organizations at the level of government departments too, are equally susceptible. Once a scam happens on a global scale, there could be disastrous consequences for people even remotely related to the hacked systems. Even without estimating the loss caused by this latest episode; scams that range from seemingly small hacks like personal information to huge corporate thefts amount to around $ 3.5 trillion annually.
What do organizations do to prevent these scams?
The big question for organizations in the wake of the possibility that they could become victims of such scams is: What do we do to protect ourselves from such scams? This is a serious topic that merits serious attention and learning. Preventing a scam is in an organization’s own interest, and the sooner it takes the right steps and the tighter it makes them; the better.
The first line of defense is in arming the employees with all the information and steps needed for recognizing and preempting the damage that can happen with such incidents. All employees need to be taught how to sense and respond to a suspicious mail. Often, unwittingly opening a seemingly innocuous sounding mail opens the keys to what could become a potential floodgate.
Worse, an employee could himself be the source of such mails that could be sent out with the malicious intention of hacking critical company information. The organization’s security systems should be extremely vigilant and diligent. It should be working round the clock and be monitoring suspicious activities. This calls for scrutiny at the highest levels, all the time.
A learning session on how to deal with scams
All these aspects of corporate scams will be the content of a webinar that this being organized by TrainHR, a leading provider of professional trainings for the human resources industry. The speaker at this webinar is Paula Pierce, an Austin, Texas attorney who provides legal services to identity theft victims and previously founded a regional legal services program for victims of identity theft and financial fraud. She has authored numerous publications for victims of identity theft and for attorneys and is a frequent speaker on identity theft and financial fraud.
To gain insights into this highly important topic of deep and critical relevance; please enroll for this webinar by visiting TrainHR. Viewing this webinar, its entirety qualifies for a recertification credit hour that may be counted toward SHRM-CP and SHRM-SCP recertification from SHRM.
Credit is awarded based on the actual educational time spent in the program.
This webinar has been approved for 1 HR (General) recertification credit hours toward aPHR, PHR, PHRca, SPHR, GPHR, PHRi and SPHRi recertification through HR Certification Institute (HRCI).
The core of this webinar is teaching the participants how to spot a potential scam in the organization, be it an email, a phone call or just a text. Paula will cover the following areas at this webinar:
- Common Scams that Target Businesses
- Anatomy of a Scam
- How to Recognize a Phishing Scam
- How to Avoid Ransomware Attacks
- How to Respond to a Ransomware Attack
- Steps Employees should take to Avoid Scams
- Steps Employees should take to Report and Respond to Scams
- When a Business must Notify Employees or Customers.
