Scammers target Brookline
FBI probes attempt to raid funds in treasury
Federal investigators are probing a cyberscam in Brookline that nearly succeeded in emptying funds from the town’s treasury.
The incident, a business email compromise scam, played out in late November when an email sent to the town sought — and nearly gained — access to public funds, Town Administrator Mel Kleckner said in a statement to the Herald.
Town Treasurer Jeana Franconi was alerted to the scam, triggering an investigation involving the town’s IT department, Brookline police and the FBI, Kleckner said.
“These agencies,” he added, “are credited for their prompt and effective action and preventing the loss of any Town funds.”
Kleckner said Brookline has taken steps to ensure the town can “respond to cyberattacks of this nature if they should occur in the future.”
Brookline and the FBI declined further comment on the attack, citing the ongoing investigation.
Last year, the FBI office in Boston issued an alert on the sophisticated email scams, warning businesses that more than 370 victims have reported losing a combined $33 million.
Individual losses ranged from $500 to $5.9 million, and the FBI was able to help return $13 million.
“The business email compromise scam is one of the fastest-growing schemes we’ve seen over the past few years,” FBI Boston spokeswoman Kristen Setera told the Herald.
In the business email compromise scams, people spoof a company email — with variants of the email or by hacking accounts — to assume the identity of a CEO, a vendor or some other authority in the organization to convince a money manager to transfer funds to an account the scammer controls.
“Criminals also use malware to infiltrate company networks, gaining access to legitimate e-mail threads about billing and invoices,” the FBI said in its alert. “They then use that information to make sure the suspicions of an accountant or financial officer aren’t raised when a fraudulent wire transfer is requested.”
The FBI said it believes “members of international organized crime groups” are the main perpetrators of the fraud.