Most estimates put the cost of Telephone Fraud at over $20
billion per year and growing. And with
the changes in telephone technology, hackers are becoming more
sophisticated. With the advent of VoIP
technologies, business users can log into their phone system remotely to make
and receive telephone calls. The hackers
are taking advantage of this. On top of
all of this, the Telecom Carriers are being much more selective in when they
will provide credits for fraud.
The largest segment of fraud is coming from hackers that are
able to get into a business’ telephone system and then initiate international
(011) type calls. And where it used to
be that these hackers were then just getting free international calls, that is
not the case today. In most cases, the
hackers have a relationship with the carrier that is terminating the calls at
the other end. The way the telephone
system works, this means that the hacker gets a percentage of the cost of that
call.
So, how can businesses prevent this from happening to
them? The first step is to make it
difficult for a hacker to get in to your system. But, at least equally important, is
minimizing the damage if a hacker does get access to your phone system. The easiest thing to do is to restrict or
completely block international (011) calls.
This can usually be done within your phone system or even better with
your telecom carrier.
If you are concerned about telephone fraud and have
questions about how to protect your business, please give us a call.