Travel companies are not doing enough to protect themselves against cyber fraud despite being more vulnerable to suffering a severe financial hit following the Covid pandemic.
That is the message from travel anti-fraud group PROFiT (Prevention Of Fraud in Travel) ahead of next week’s Travolution half-day Cyber Summit.
Barry Gooch, founder and chairman of PROFiT, will present the results of industry surveys carried out by the organisation into firms’ awareness of and effort to prevent online fraud.
“What we were trying to find out is why people have not adapted. We have gone into companies that have been attacked and find out they haven’t done the basics.
“Big companies are coming up with policies but travel is one of those sectors that is dominated by one man bands and micro-entities. They say it will never happen to me.”
Gooch said due to the impact of the pandemic on travel firm finances it is more important than ever that they protect themselves from attacks by cyber criminals.
And with many firms having moved to remote or hybrid working there are more potential areas of weakness for malevolent actors to target.
The war in Ukraine has also seen a surge in cyber crime which even if it does not directly target travel firms could see them suffer collateral damage.
Gooch said post-pandemic there has been a significant rise in cyber criminals using shadow domains to access and take over accounts or diverted payments pages.
“To be honest we are in a period of time where most organisations in whatever sector you are in is thinking about where are they ging to get their income from.
“It really has been bad for travel since the start of the pandemic and everyone is in survival mode, so it does not surprise me at all that people are not listening to the warnings.
“But financially everyone is fragile and they simply cannot afford to allow this to happen to them.”
At the Cyber Summit PROFiT will share the stage with Terry Wilson, chief operating officer of the Global Cyber Alliance, who will set out their business essentials toolkit for companies.