JPMorgan Chase & Co. , the country's largest lender, is stepping up payment fraud protections for its small and mid-sized business customers, which continue to be targeted by scammers - particularly amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Four-in-five small and mid-sized companies say they were targets of payment fraud last year, but that could be reduced if businesses use more tools to detect suspicious payments early, JPMorgan executives told Reuters.The bank's new self-service"fraud hub," being introduced on Monday, will allow them to set alerts for unusually large payments and control who gets paid. The service supplements the current system in which customers call the bank to set controls.
The measures come amid a broader industry campaign to get businesses to be more vigilant against a major source of payment fraud: legitimate-looking emails, often impersonating the chief executive, with bogus instructions for paying suppliers or other third parties. To help small businesses spot vulnerabilities, the bank is offering to add a"safety meter" to customer account dashboards which graphically shows how they score on setting safeguards, including suspicious transaction alerts.