 and how would maybe someone know that okay this process has not been intercepted and possibly this could lead to payment fraud. So let's start by trying to understand a little bit and the tasks of ways that these forces perpetrate this fraud. If you are seeing my face for the first time right now this podcast we talk about each and every single thing in the property industry we're talking buying selling investing and even growing your portfolio in the property space. So if you join us for the first time welcome and thank you for joining us throw those green hearts in the comment section share this live with anybody who you think is going to benefit from listening to us today and I trust I like I tell you you're gonna have a good time definitely you're going to be informed and you're going to leave this space a little bit better with property information and knowledge so tonight I'm joined by Ryan Merr who's the CEO or EFT short Africa who's going to be talking to us about a very important and imperative issue in the property space how to not get scammed we're talking why the property industry needs to protect themselves from payment fraud Ryan good evening and thank you for joining us to me thanks for having me here so tonight we're talking about a very important issue and very important factor you know scammers scammers are everywhere these days and they have really gone online people are trying to you know protect themselves and the property industry is one of those industries that's not exempt I mean there's huge amount of money that's changing hands each and every single day in this industry so talk to us a little bit more what property fraud is and what it looks like so I think the first thing I just wanted to mention that payment fraud is really not specific to the property industry and in fact it impacts just about every every single business out there and you know cybercrime and payment fraud in particular is you know is a very real thing it's something that's you know growing at a rapid rate and you know when it comes to the property industry you know people in the industry many people in the industry certainly have stories to tell around payment fraud and they're starting to pay attention to how to improve processes and controls you know within the organizations to help mitigate against a payment fraud risk and we in fact are engaging with number of them we've got a number of them as clients and you know those that aren't really really ought to really ought to sure let's talk who are the typical players when we are talking about payment fraud in the property industry I know there's of course biases but who else could probably be a role player and who who could stand at risk you know for 44 for payment fraud sure so I mean there's a number of players in the property space so you know from property developers to property management companies convincing attorneys state agents property funds you know really any property professionals out there I think you know what's important to understand is again you mentioned it you know why is the property space such a target and the big reason for that is there's just large sums of money involved in the property space so you know as a target it's great to be able to target you know large sums of money when you're perpetrating payment fraud what's also important is that um very often because they're such large sums involved on a day-to-day basis um even if you target slightly smaller amounts it can be a little bit easier because those may not be given so much attention you know maybe 50,000 and you know when you're dealing with millions in the property space it kind of doesn't get given the attention that the largest sum would but in the meantime it's possible not to money for a fraudster no definitely and you know we're talking about these different players and for for laymen they might not understand where these people sit because if you ask me I would think that when I'm buying properties just a conversation between a buyer and a seller and of course we have come to know that there are all of these other stakeholders that are involved and I wanted to talk about the kind of scenarios that you would find um scammers that are accepting those processes that you're mentioning um in order for them to make a quick buck how would the processes look and how would maybe someone know that okay this process has not been intercepted and possibly this could lead to to payment fraud so I think let's let's start by trying to like understand a little bit around the tasks of of ways that these forces perpetrate this fraud so one of one of the biggest things not nice to say to Africa it's global is the thing called business email compromise bc and really what that is is it forces actually hacking they intercept emails and it can be you know coming emails and it can be you know private emails the advantages are when they do intercept these emails they can manipulate any of the information that's contained there in and things like payment details payment instructions and all of that which very often does take place by email you know when you're dealing with property transfers very often buyers and sellers are communicating with conveyance attorneys with state agents with all of those kind of players you know in space and that's all happening by email so when those emails get intercepted um and these forces start you know uh manipulating the information in there you know that's one one huge uh um place where this sort of thing happens the second thing in relation to emails of things like even impersonations where um your email addresses are mimicked and they pretend to be people from within the company or you know people their company is dealing with or their people are dealing with um you know even things like system hacks are becoming more of a thing so um you know the external fraud factors that are mentioned there are very often organized criminal syndicates that are behind us and then of course every company unfortunately does face the risk of internal fraud as well where people internally can manipulate information you know from from within an organization so I think um you know when you have a look at how to uh you know uh with scenarios where where these sort of things happen let's take the property transfer suggestions as an example um you know you've got a uh a sell out and a purchase of a property you've got a conveyance maternity uh in the middle that's that's dealing with it you know the money is generally flowing into that conveyance maternity trust account and then the conveyance maternity is settling um the seller at the end and you know there have been you know real life examples where payment instructions have been given through these intercepted emails to for example maybe the conveyance maternities where uh those funds for the sale of their property ultimately landed up you know for the bank account as opposed to the actual sellers and uh you know the problem there is that kicks off a whole process you know of who's responsible and and you know what ends up happening from there and um president has been set in in the courts around us that at the end of the day you know certainly like in you know the case of conveyance into his law firms you know estate agents where there's trust accounts involved um the owners is on those those companies to uh make sure that they uh are actually paying those funds to their intercepted their responsibility to do that and you know that's that's where that's where people just have to be really really cautious they have to be cautious in terms of making sure they know ultimately you know who they are dealing with and make sure that they verify you know key information before payments are ultimately made sure and i could i can just imagine when you're going through a sale you know going through um a process like this that one really has these different feelings you know of the segment and a little bit of anxiety so um please talk us through what what signs should one look out for when they are probably in the process of sale or purchase for them to know because sometimes these um these these scams happen two ways you know one believes they can happen on the side also on the on the bias side so just talk to us what signs what should look out for when they are when they are engaged in this process so you know as you know as i mentioned very often these things start with with email and an interception of email that's where some attacks come through so you know just first your general email sense is very important don't click on links that you're not 100% sure of don't open attachments that that that you're not 100% sure of because that allows forces you know in very often um the second thing is you've got to pay a lot of attention to to email addresses to you know scrutinize those email addresses are they in fact the email addresses that you have been dealing with all along and do they belong to you know the the people or the companies that you have been dealing with the minute people start trying to manipulate where payments need to go to that's a red flag when people start talking we've changed bank details can the payment instead go to this account instead of this account those are huge huge red flags you know up front um but the reality is um this is the professional forces right this is what they do day in and day out so very often it's not that easy to to detect it especially you know as you said we've got all these emotions and and just from a business perspective when you you're trying to move on with day-to-day business and and just gonna make all your journal payments in there it's not that easy to pick these things up so i think you know certainly if you're on the individual side you know buy a set that type of thing um just act always with extreme caution and again make sure that you are verifying those payment details in an independent manner you know even that just use your common sense around that you know so if you're trying to verify details you know telephone call to the the company or to the center that you know who you've been dealing with it can can go a long way but make sure that the number that you're calling is not for example the number that's just on the email because their email's intercepted there's a good chance their telephone number is in fact the number of fraudster no such um great insights there you know things that why don't you really look up for because the moment we are talking about uh syndicates and people are very arranging this they probably cleared up some of these emails in their mind that they probably know what people are going to be looking for so thank you so much for that um just quickly i will hop onto our social media engagement thank you so much always coming through and showing us some love um Lili Sichangla says buyers are most affected with these rogue emails and pretending to be conveyance because um this is where it happens you know the buyers are the ones who end up um with these um with these consequences because then they send money to the wrong person and um they've got nobody else to blame because at the at the time there is nobody on the other side so it is very very important to do some of those things that Ryan was mentioning that you just check that one phone call might just save you a lot of money so we asked a question on social media this week and we asked if you have been scam trying to buy property and a lot of people have a lot of people responded to this but we only picked about two or three where it is so of course most buyers or sellers probably don't know where to report scammers in the conduct of agents like and you influence as well as this representation um so it is common to ask the agent or property practitioner a valid for the entity fund um for the entity fund certificate so sometimes they don't they don't know you know because if if something happened to one person and nobody reported it then it just stays an isolated incident so it's one of the great things that we um the world of math helps with as well as social media in this day and age where people can chain information about these scams and all of these um other things that um happen in this space um Gabelo says he well he's very fortunate because he says no because I've got good intuition and I'll just throw back the question to you right and say um do you think intuition helps in this case because um even the people with the greatest intuition have been scammed um at some point or another because of a mishap so do you think it plays a role uh look I think I think intuition can play a role but um you know certainly if you talk around your businesses for example um b2b type of stuff uh you definitely can't be relying on on intuition and database there's too much going on there's too many payments to be made um and and there's no chance that you can rely on intuition and even as an individual I think that's relying on intuition is uh is quite it's quite dangerous because you know as you say emotions you get involved as well so I think intuition act on intuition if you have it but apply logic as well you know try to apply a common sense and logic and uh you know at the end of the day uh you know you gotta protect that money as an individual and as a business sure um being in this industry where you facilitate payments and um really these these large sums of money what's some what are some of the lessons that you have learned maybe even um mistake that you have made that have taught you valuable lessons that you would advise somebody to to look up for so I think you know one of the biggest things that I've learned is how easy people are manipulated and you know forces you know very often think very often people think that uh you know forces and hackers and guys who are doing all this kind of thing are are brilliant because of the fact that they've hacked you know email or they've they've had systems or all that kind of stuff but what they're really doing is manipulating people and that's where they are your experts and so what I've learned is at the end of the day um you know certainly if we talk on the business side which is primarily where we play as you have to share you know try and move away from what I would call is the old old school way of relying on manual processes and people for your internal controls um you know the world is digitized the digital transformation and you know I think every business should be looking for ways to digitize and automate internal controls and processes uh to to deal with uh with with payment for because um unfortunately where you are relying on people people can be manipulated and ultimately there are gaps in those processes um you know when it comes to to individuals I think that um you know it's the same thing that people just get manipulated and so it's a little harder um you know for individuals to adopt uh you know the technology uh solutions because they individuals and just making uh you know payments but uh I think again just just try your best to apply common sense to to that kind of stuff um is is is absolutely critical I'd like to bring a bit home now and talk more on the on the seller side because we're talking buyers and how maybe they can can be scared of the money that they want to buy a property what about uh sellers because at times we may think that there's no fraud that exists there um and they may be relaxed while um they can get caught off guard so let's talk a bit about how there can be some fraud in the in the sales space so we're talking payment fraud you know specifically at the end of the day a sale has to be paid for the sale of that property and you know certainly when you are um you when you're going through you know proper as a condensing attorney is uh you know for the transfer of those of those properties um I think that that's an important aspect uh you know doing a private sale there's risk involved you know and that risk is again you know you've got two parties communicating with each other and you know if there is uh you know interception of a center you know providing bank details to that buyer or uh you know an email going to the buyer to say on behalf you know pretending to be the center saying you know we've changed our bank account details or please pay into this account instead the reality is if that payment lands up in the wrong account it's not in the center's account yeah and you know you might say well it's not the center's problem but it is the center's problem because once that money is gone then you know it's gone and the center loses the deal potentially you know and and that's a problem you know for a sale um yeah so so I think there's the center's definitely uh the elements that the center needs to be careful of here as well no definitely um I'll just also hop on to um the social media engagement huge shout out to Iwan Masook who's joining us for the first time who's already saying that uh she's glad to be here and the conversation is very informative Queen Tako says lovely topic for tonight so she's clearly enjoying the conversation we are having Polina Makosi is also here a regular shout out to you Polina and thank you also for joining us tonight so we're also going to be talking about something that I personally think each person needs to to get to know because we want to talk about how to manage it you know how to manage you not falling into it we've spoken um about um how it looks and what and what are the possible scenarios so I want us to really talk in now in in terms of us managing the payment fraud to say um if it does happen I'm saying that there should be quarters that um bias instead of to say um thresholds that they are asking for payments or if things should be paid in in different installments how can we manage it to make sure that it really doesn't happen to one I think the key word is verification firstly uh believe that it's it's huge in any of the payments sort of space um verify the information and especially the payment information not only the payment information verify who you're dealing with you know the concept of you know FICA and that you know the reason for that is it's understanding you know who you're dealing with and uh is that a legitimate person some kind of concept should be it should be adopted you know in in generally the payment space understand who you deal with is a legitimate person is a legitimate company you know do those bank account details actually belong to this company you know things like google and that are very useful you know we're not understanding that that kind of stuff you can find a lot of information in general out there um you know you can always look at you know company details on on accept see that details on stars um you know those all help to piece together is this the like a legitimate company that you that you're making a payment to um but verification I think is is really key I think you know you spoke about potentially installments of payment um yeah I mean I think you know again yeah if you if you make a sort of smaller payment as an initial payment um then itself can also act as a almost a tester a feeler to make sure that is landing where it's supposed to be landing so you know if you make a sort of smaller installment up front on the property site I'm going to pay the first x amount into the account within a certain period of time and then you contact the seller you know you know all the you know and say did you receive that um and wait for them to give you the confirmation then you know those details are also you know legitimate so um yeah I think you know again verification key and and just trying to apply some some calm practical common sense and don't rush into things and don't be pressured into immediate and urgent payments because that's where these guys are as well I think so I think the the the pressuring into uh the payment you know I've I've seen it I haven't really been scared before but I have I've seen I've seen it and I guess the intuition and that practical common sense comes into play away the moment you start getting getting pressured into making a payment and they make you feel some sort of anxiety that if you don't make the payment now you know we can't guarantee anything we can't guarantee that you will get this they get this house this apartment you it may say um it makes it really really really important that um we we look out for for such things and we just really talking about um the payment of buying and selling houses do you think that in the leasing and in the tenant space this could also be put a potential risk I think it's a risk it's a risk everywhere it's a risk everywhere and um you know just just one just if I take one step back sorry for reminding me just you ask for um because you actually raised a very bad point there you ask for your red flags yeah just just just add to the red flags when that when you when people are putting you under pressure and there's urgent payments that's a red flag you know as well that's where you will take a step back and say you know you know then you just reassess us but um yeah you know in relation to to all aspects of property industry whether you're a property developer you're making payments constantly for you know services and materials those can be large amounts you know sometimes it's it's not too recurring type of supplies depending where the developments are more local supplies which might mean one sort of type of payments you know one sort of payments hold a huge amount of risk that's in property development property managers you know they deal a lot with leasing type of type of stuff and with maintenance of complexes and that kind of thing there's a large amount of you know ongoing you know work and and things that are that are done there payments back to uh you know less ease payments to less source uh you know deposits and all of that kind of stuff and again you know it all poses risk um because you know you're dealing you're dealing with very often one sort of payments so it's very difficult to know because you don't have a relationship with that person that you would on a recurring type of basis if you're making payments to people um but also just the volume you know the volume of payment we're dealing with it's a large complex it's a multiple less season and less source and multiple uh you know payments will work done and all of that um again to share volume means it puts a lot of pressure on individuals and people who are dealing with it sure thank you so much um if you just joined us we are still talking payment fraud so if you if you haven't caught up on the conversation we're just going we're almost at the tail end and we're really talking about how you can predict yourself and how you can spot those red flags to know that there is something fishy here and this might be a possible scam so Ryan who do we report um these these scams to like if if somebody potentially got scammed or even did get scammed um they might not have um recovery or might not be able to recover their money back but who can they report this to so that if an effort to put this to an end at least you know is is is started so you know it's there are things such as the sacred for prevention services which is important to report these things to um certainly if you've been scammed and payment fraud i would definitely be alerting your bank and in relation to the bank account that has scammed you so that you know they can uh you know communicate with with a relevant bank and uh that particular account can be scrutinized potentially frozen but um yeah i think those are probably the key things to do but you know what's important to understand is very often um liberty to recover that money is very slim because these forces move it very quickly so um yeah you know i think prevention is better than um you know dealing with it dealing with it afterwards unfortunately sure and you just answered this question um Martha Martha she uh she can't get just asked us is there any recalls and um as Ryan just said um they they move them so quickly by the time you get to to to the way the money went it's probably not there anymore so vigilance verification is very important before you make that payment so right let's talk last words what would you say to um anything holder who is in the property space um in terms of the king of payment for one of the things um that you would advise them to do and potentially not do so i think the first thing which i which i mentioned earlier is just i think take a good hard look at your internal controls and processes around payments and that starts from how are you onboarding you know your your payees what process you have in place to verify the information that's been received how are you managing effectively that you know master data of those suppliers um you know on an ongoing basis and you know ultimately what what controls you have in place around the actual payments and i think that it's it's it's time to start moving away from relying on people in manual processes time to start implementing you know technology to to assist to um you know improve those processes tighten those controls and remove reliance on people quite aside from an efficiency perspective you know just to help mitigate that uh that forward aspect and i think you know just keep yourself up to date with those sort of scams that are going on out there keep yourself informed especially a few people uh or a person in the company that is responsible for for these type of of of controls and and ultimately outgoing payments in the company and make sure you communicate to to people in the business make sure that everyone is aware of the types of of scams and and and that that is out there keep them constantly aware uh you know try and you know adopt best policies in relation to emails so things like you know security on emails you know again making sure people are will keep on reminding people not to click on links and attachments you know that 100% sure of where it's come from um you know those type of things i think always always just applying that um you know that's applying that that that sort of mind of of portion every time you know there's there's there's uh you know things that that are just not uh normal when it comes to to to payments and even things that are normal uh you know don't don't sort of be complacent around it most certainly thank you so much you know it's it's it's really comforting to know that from now on we can start being vigilant with us and if you have a story that you would like to share with us um drop it in the conversation let everybody as um in the conversation know you know it's as as Ryan said our awareness is very important you know the the simplest of things that you that you spotted some someone may not spot the red flag that you spotted someone may not spot so it's very important that we do that knowledge sharing and that information sharing thank you so so much Ryan for for such a wealth of information we really we really are armed you know these these cameras are not really getting past the private property family do me thanks very much thank you so much thank you so much we really appreciate it so with that we bring a close to tonight's conversation thank you so much for joining us i'm sure that now you know let's be vigilant let's verify and let's make sure that we apply that simple logic you know to just check you know to pick up that call and call that number and verify that the person you are speaking to is who they claim they are thank you so much for joining us tonight on the private property podcast see you same time same place right here on our property on on on our private property page at 7 p.m thank you so much for joining us and have a good night