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2021-03-31
By: Advocate Brokerage
We recently read a local news story about a woman who lives in Scarsdale who had fallen victim to a cyber-security scam.
The woman was led to believe that someone had purchased a computer using her Amazon account. She called the phone number provided in an email and when speaking with the scammer who was posing as an Amazon rep, she was advised that if she didn’t want the computer shipped to her home, she needed to go online and cancel the order. According to the police, if the woman followed instructions, her money would be returned to her. She was instructed to type $800 into a link provided and as she did so, she noticed that two more zeroes appeared in the file bringing her total to $80,000.
During the three-day ordeal that included transfers to supervisors at Amazon (which made the deception much more believable), the woman was defrauded of $80,000.
Many of us shop on Amazon and it is not hard to imagine getting so caught up in trying to resolve a fraudulent charge that you could be misled by a cyber-criminal. The good news is that many of our elite carriers offer Cyber Fraud coverage and cyber theft is one of the main items these policies address (coverage is of course subject to the actual terms of the policy and exclusions apply as per the policy).
· Criminal deception such as the story shared above
· Unauthorized transfers or payments
· Check forgery
· Counterfeit Money
· Identity Fraud
· Extortion & ransomware
· Fiscal loss
· Cyber-bullying
· Cyber disruption of business
· Breach of privacy
If you would like more information on Cyber Coverage, please feel free to give us a call and we can review the coverage offered by our carrier partners.
