News / Africa
SA ID theft jumps
28 Oct 2015 at 17:20hrs | Views
Cape Town - Identity theft in South Africa is on the rise as cyber crooks eye stealing from company executives, a survey has found.
According to a 2015 Metrofile Information and Records Management Index of 200 executive managers of local companies, 7% of respondents indicated that their companies had been the victim of identity theft in the last year.
That number is up four percentage points from 2014 as cyber crooks eye lucrative schemes to steal personal and financial data.
"It is more lucrative for criminals to target businesses, rather than individuals, when it comes to perpetrating identity theft scams," said Gianmarco Lorenzi, managing director of Cleardata.
According to the survey, 31% of respondents were either victims of cyber crime themselves or knew someone who was - a 12% increase.
A typical scam involves sending fake letters with company logos, instructing customers to make payments using the new details.
"The customer, thinking this is an authentic business letter, then makes payments into the fraudulent account. The scam comes to light when the business contacts the customer to establish why payments are not being made, only to discover the funds have been paid into the fraudulent account," said Lorenzi.
According to a 2015 Metrofile Information and Records Management Index of 200 executive managers of local companies, 7% of respondents indicated that their companies had been the victim of identity theft in the last year.
That number is up four percentage points from 2014 as cyber crooks eye lucrative schemes to steal personal and financial data.
According to the survey, 31% of respondents were either victims of cyber crime themselves or knew someone who was - a 12% increase.
A typical scam involves sending fake letters with company logos, instructing customers to make payments using the new details.
"The customer, thinking this is an authentic business letter, then makes payments into the fraudulent account. The scam comes to light when the business contacts the customer to establish why payments are not being made, only to discover the funds have been paid into the fraudulent account," said Lorenzi.
Source - news24
