Any given day, in any given company, any given executive receives a call from someone who is advising the company on acquiring a foreign company. After an exchange of emails, a significant sum of money and the signatures of the company's representatives… it turns out that the money ended up in a cybercriminal organization. Unfortunately, we are talking about a story based on real events.
This happened last September to 2019 the director of EMT Valencia. An alleged takeover of a Chinese company ended with 4 millions of euros transferred to a bank account that ultimately turned out to belong to a cybercriminal organization.
Obviously this employee was fired, initially unfairly. Finalmente el Tribunal Superior de Justicia de la Comunidad Valenciana falló que este despido fue procedente, ya que aprecia una actuación transgrediendo la buena fe contractual y cometiendo un abuso de confianza de su cargo. En el mismo auto, se rechazan las alegaciones de la víctima, que afirmaba cumplir los requerimientos recibidos por la persona que suplantaba la identidad de sus superiores. In the latter case, los jueces entienden que la víctima debería haber comprobado que la información recibida era legítima.
Francisco Pérez Bes, antiguo secretario general del Instituto Nacional de Ciberseguridad (INCIBE) explica que “los deberes de buena fe, lealtad y fidelidad, han de observarse con mayor rigor por parte de aquellas personas que desempeñan puestos de responsabilidad”. It also highlights that the fact that company documentation was requested should have alerted the director.
At last, the ruling shows an “absolute lack of judgment” and a “serious negligence” on the part of the victim.
The sequence of these events makes us aware of the possible scams we could suffer, this time we would be talking about the use of social engineering for a criminal to achieve their goal. On this occasion, the story ended with the victim facing charges due to her negligence and the company suffering serious damages. We must always remain alert to potential scams and really verify what we are reading and signing.
Image: Photo of People created by tirachardz – www.freepik.es
Fountain:El Economista