Regulation and Compliance Federal Regulation FINRA

FINRA Warns of Email Phishing Scam

News May 04, 2020 at 04:50 PM
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The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority warned broker-dealers Monday of phishing emails that purport to be from the self-regulator.

In Regulatory Notice 20-12, FINRA states that the scam is "a widespread, ongoing phishing campaign that involves fraudulent emails" that claim to be from FINRA officers, including Bill Wollman and Josh Drobnyk.

The emails have a source domain name "@broker-finra.org" and request immediate attention to an attachment relating to a broker-dealer firm.

The domain of broker-finra.org is not connected to FINRA and firms should delete all emails originating from this domain name, FINRA states. Also, FINRA has requested that the internet domain registrar suspend services for broker-finra.org.

"In at least in some cases, the emails do not actually include the attachment, in which case they may be attempting to gain the recipient's trust so that a follow-up email can be sent with an infected attachment or link, or a request for confidential firm information," FINRA explains. "In other cases, what appears to be an attached PDF file may direct the user to a website which prompts the user to enter their Microsoft Office or SharePoint password."

FINRA urged anyone who entered their password to change it immediately and notify the appropriate individuals in their firm of the incident.

Firms should verify the legitimacy of any suspicious email prior to responding to it, opening any attachments or clicking on any embedded links, FINRA states.

For more information, firms should review the resources provided on FINRA's Cybersecurity Topic Page, including the Phishing section of its Report on Cybersecurity Practices – 2018.

— Check out Key Tech Steps for RIAs Working From Home on ThinkAdvisor.

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