You are on the accounts payable staff of a private company. It is 4:30 Friday afternoon, and you receive an urgent email from the CEO (Mrs. Banks). In this urgent email, Mrs. Banks directs you, in no uncertain terms, to immediately wire $750,000 to pay a very important bill before the close of business. You try to reach your boss, but she is gone for the weekend. You try to reach your boss’ boss, the CFO, who is not answering his phone. Last, you take a deep breath, swallow, and call Mrs. Banks directly to verify the request; you reach her voicemail. You look closely at the email and it looks totally legitimate. It is now 4:55 p.m., so you swallow even harder and wire the money hoping it was a legitimate request and go home for the weekend. It turns out you were scammed.

Originally published in Aon Advisor Solutions - Fall 2018.