Cybersecurity · April 2025
W-2 and wire-transfer fraud: the scams that peak at tax time
The most expensive scams rarely involve hacking, they involve a convincing email and a rushed decision.
Business email compromise (BEC) is the costliest category of cybercrime for small organizations, and it surges in spring, when payroll data is moving and finance teams are busy.
How it works
An attacker impersonates an executive or a trusted vendor and asks for either employee W-2s (to file fraudulent returns) or an "urgent" wire transfer or banking change. The email looks right, the tone feels right, and the pressure is real, so someone acts before verifying.
How to stop it
- Require out-of-band verification, a call to a known number, for any payment, banking change, or sensitive-data request
- Be suspicious of urgency and secrecy, the two hallmarks of BEC
- Lock down email with MFA and filtering so accounts cannot be hijacked in the first place
One simple verification policy prevents the large majority of these losses.
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