ACTA reminds members to be aware of corporate travel fraud

Following a recent spike in travel fraud through agency corporate accounts, the ACTA Fraud Prevention Committee is highlighting some tactics being used by fraudsters.

In one recent case reviewed by ACTA, the fraudster posed as an employee of the corporate account from Australia (the actual corporate account is American based) with an email address nearly matching that of the company. The fraudster, posing as a contact at the corporate office responsible for the travel bookings for the corporate traveller, contacted the travel agency to make the bookings. The bookings were made after 5 p.m. on a Friday afternoon and the fraudster booked two tickets: one from London to Islamabad on a one way flight and another from London/Mumbai/Dubai/London, for a total cost of $7,000.

According to ACTA, the criminal in this scenario used the e-mail domain of an agent’s corporate account, but slightly changed the domain by adding a letter or a number or an extension, leading an agent to believe it was the corporate account’s email domain. 

As for after-hours, weekends and a 24/7 call center, these requests are at greater risk from someone pretending to be from a corporate account, saying they need a password reset or requiring access to a corporate on-line booking tool. Often the criminal will use their e-mail address atGmail, Yahoo, etc., stating that they are away and can’t access their corporate email account and/or they use an account spoofing a real e-mail domain.

Typically the fraudster will look to book departure/arrival itineraries, one-way tickets and immediate departures from international airports, often to West African airports like ACC, LOS, DKR, CMN and/or South American airports like BOG, LIM, EZE, GRU.

ACTA is advising that all travel agents within an agency know who their corporate clients are so that if unusual requests for travel come through, the agent can call their client and the credit card issuer to verify transaction and/or refer the booking to their supervisor.