How to Prevent and Respond to ACH Fraud

The Automated Clearing House is an electronic system used to transfer money between financial instiutions through digital transactions. The ACH can be used to pay mortages, utilities and other monthly expenses.

Cybercriminals have increasingly been targeting the ACH to conduct fraud. Cybercriminals can transfer money from a victim's account to their own, buy goods and services using fund's in a victim's account, or steal their payment card to make fraudulent purchases.

All a cybercriminal needs to conduct ACH fraud is to have a person's routing and account numbers. They can steal this through phishing attacks, or could possibly come across this information on the dark web after it was leaked in a breach.

If you come across a scenario where someone asks for your account and routing numbers, or if you believe these data points may already be at risk, reach out to the BlackCloak Concierge team and our staff will help you with any next steps.

It's imperative for anyone using the ACH systems to protect themselves from instances of ACH fraud, as well as knowing what steps you should take should you fall victim to this cybercrime.

How to Protect Yourself from ACH Fraud

• Place ACH blocks on your accounts, which would require you to personally approve each transaction before it can be completed.
• Set up strong passwords for all of your accounts. Make sure each password or passphrase is unique. By creating a strong password, it will make it harder for cybercriminals to access your account and funds.
• Set up alerts to inform you whenever money leaves your account, which will help you spot suspicious activity.
• Set up fraud alert texts that will tell you whether there's a potentially suspicious transaction on your account.
• Enable multifactor authentication on your accounts to add another layer of security to your sensitive information and funds.
• Create an authoritzed user list for regular transactions to ensure only entities you approve of can take funds.

How to Best Respond to ACH Fraud

• Dispute the fraudulent transaction as soon as possible. Anyone can dispute a transaction either 60 days of receiving a statement from the bank listing the fraudulent transaction, or within 60 days of the settlement date. If a victim does not dispute the transaction within that time frame, the bank does not have to reimburse them. For businesses, the dispute must happen within 24 hours of the transaction.