Not only is the general public targeted by scammers, but investment advisers are too. Consider this hypothetical: One morning a member of the Cravens and Company Wealth Management Team opens an email from what seems to be you requesting a distribution of funds for a very common reason. All the while, a hacker has infiltrated your email and is now seeking to move funds to a fraudulent account. If policies and procedures were not in place, this would be a disastrous financial event. However, we are aware of this threat and align ourselves with industry leaders to protect your assets from all manners of threats. We engage our staff in training which implements necessary steps to mitigate this risk.
One of the largest components for preventing fraud is a basic understanding of how email based wire fraud works. Email based wire fraud happens when an unauthorized person gains access to your email account. Once your account has been compromised the unauthorized person will browse through your emails and find ways to exploit them for fraudulent financial gain. One way which we combat this threat is by getting verbal confirmation from you before we distribute or transfer funds.
As with most things, one of the best ways to prevent fraud is educating yourself on the most common ways it is committed. All of our employees are aware of the nature of this risk and prevention methods used to thwart it. Our team is ever diligent regarding system security. Multilayered firewalls are constantly in place to protect your data. While there are no guarantees to ever be entirely protected, working together we can provide a substantial barrier to reduce considerably the risk associated with fraud.