I can tell you a story not just close to home but AT home: I sold a property to another investor, we closed at an Attorney/Title office and he wired the funds to my account and showed in my balance. Four days later at 5:30pm I am about to go out the door and something told me to check my account. The money was NOT THERE! I happened to have the attorney's cell phone and I called him to ask what happened. He said, "Didn't you email me and tell me to wire it to your other account?". I said "No". There was this looooong silence on the phone.
Long story short someone had hacked in to his email account and created a email with just one letter different than mine, same last name. After the closing they started emailing him and told him to send the funds to an account in Washington state (we are in Ohio)! They even copied some of our earlier messages to make it look like it was a continuation of our correspondence. He fell for it, didn't notice the differences, and didn't call me to verify. So some @#$% got free money that immediately went out of the country. Fortunately the attorney knew it was his mistake and he made up the money to me within a few days (I hope his E&O took care of him).
What was amazing to me was that four days AFTER the money was wired to my real account that transfer was able to be reversed and then sent elsewhere. I always though that once a wire was done it was DONE. Apparently not. However I'm sure if I asked a bank to do that they would refuse. |
