Tax season is upon us which has companies filing paperwork, reporting data, and looking over their shoulders to avoid scams left and right.
This time of year, cyber criminals up their game to gain access to company, personal employee, and payroll information. The FBI and the IRS put out alerts warning HR and CFOs of the predatory attacks that are common or on the rise.
Cyber criminals often choose phishing scams to get employees to unwittingly provide access to personnel files and company payroll systems. Posing as Human Resources or IRS representatives with legitimate looking emails and communications, the attacker will try and prompt the victim to click a link or visit a webpage to “update” or “confirm” information, and in some cases input personal information such as social security numbers. Known attacks have had criminals gain access to direct deposit siting W2 or I-9 information the needs to be completed for compliance or asking the user to update or change their username/password through their own phishing link.
Preventing A Cyber Security Breach During Tax Season
Hackers target both employees and HR management. Your best line of defense is education across the board. Federal agencies, including the IRS, put out notifications about recent attacks and what to look for. SHRM also alerts subscribers and HR professionals to potential threats and ways to protect your business and your employee data.
Communicating cyber threats and what to look for to your workforce can help to prevent employees’ succumbing to cybercrime. Training your staff to identify legitimate emails versus phishing scams, and reporting any suspicious activity to management will help to protect your company.
HCM Security Measures
In addition to internal communications, ensuring your HCM platform employs top security technology should be a priority. Netchex goes the extra mile to ensure that our clients are well protected from security breaches through our HCM technology. Our integrated payroll, time and labor, benefits, and compliance systems are tested, and retested, and challenged often by our technologists to prevent cyber threats. Not only do we provide the innovative HR solutions that drive today’s business initiatives, but our unmatched client support, including security measures, provider customers with peace of mind.
Learn why more companies switch to Netchex, and how we make it easier for you to focus on what’s really important – keeping your workforce engaged and helping you run a successful business.