Stopping invoice fraud in 7 days, and offsetting the cost of better security
A fraudster used a compromised company email to send a fake invoice, and a customer paid about $55,000 to the wrong account. We contained the breach within a week, added 24/7 protection, and found savings to help pay for it.
One convincing fake invoice cost this firm about $55,000. Our job was to make sure there wouldn’t be a second one.
Our client is a mid-sized construction firm serving international customers with a distributed billing structure. It relied on traditional invoice-based payments and had no advanced security monitoring, which left it exposed to sophisticated fraud. Then a lookalike attack hit: a fraudster used an internal email address to send a legitimate-looking invoice, and an international customer paid about $55,000 to an unauthorized account.
The challenges
No real-time fraud detection
The firm couldn’t detect invoice redirection or impersonation as it happened.
Limited billing visibility
Little insight into billing anomalies across international transactions.
No advanced threat detection
No incident response or advanced detection capabilities in place.
Email compromise exposure
Internal email compromise and spoofed messages created risk.
Rising IT costs
Growing IT and communications costs were pressuring budgets.
What we did
Our advisors led a multi-layered response to contain the breach, restore trust in billing and strengthen overall security.
Incident response and remediation
We immediately brought in a specialized incident response partner to investigate, find the root cause (internal email compromise) and fully remediate within one week.
Managed security services
We matched the firm with a managed service provider (MSP) from our partner network for ongoing IT operations and security oversight.
MDR/XDR deployment
Continuous monitoring, threat detection and faster response across endpoints, networks and cloud environments.
Cost optimization
To offset the new security investment, we moved the firm to an optimized cellular plan.
What changed
- Breach fully contained and remediated within 7 days
- No further financial loss beyond the initial $55,000 incident
- Much better threat visibility and response through MDR/XDR
- Closed the gaps that allowed internal email misuse and invoice fraud
- Central IT management and proactive monitoring through the MSP
- $1,100 a month in recurring savings from optimized mobility, balancing the new security investment
We helped this firm recover quickly and build a full cybersecurity strategy, with MDR/XDR and an MSP partnership, while mobility savings offset part of the cost.
How protected are your invoices?
Let’s assess your exposure to email and invoice fraud, before an attacker does.
