A small Dunedin business has been duped of thousands of dollars after its computer system was hacked and bogus emails sent to clients asking for money to be put into a different account.
The business, which asked not to be identified, has about 1000 home maintenance clients and most bills were sent via email and paid through internet banking.
"The scary thing is we're not going to see any of that money,'' the business owner said.
"We've got clients that are now a bit scared to deal with us over the internet. This has hugely affected our cashflow.
"This has the potential to shut a business down. It's horrible.''
About 200 clients were sent the bogus email, which said the business was undertaking an audit and could not receive payments to its regular bank account.
An alternate account was provided and at least 12 clients paid into that account.
"The frustrating thing is my clients have been paying into it ... and not one of them has called to question it. The silver lining is that clearly our clients trust us.''
They would not be asking for their clients to pay their bill again, the business owner said.
Police were notified about the hack and the cyber crime unit was investigating, the business owner said.
There was a good chance of finding the holder of the alternate bank account, as it was a New Zealand account and the person could well have got some of the profits for opening it for the scammers, she said.
Police told her the source of the scam was probably somewhere in eastern Europe but she was unlikely to see any of the money again.
"It's been a bit of a roller coaster. Hopefully, this [report] will help other businesses.''
Acting Sergeant Sam Ramsay, of Dunedin, said police were investigating.
People needed to be wary of responding to suspicious emails, he said.
Netsafe New Zealand executive director Martin Cocker said scams targeting small businesses were becoming more common as they were an easier target than large companies.
"Unfortunately, smaller businesses tend to bear a disproportionate cost of cyber crime,'' Mr Cocker said.
"These scams tend to be very effective. Businesses just have to be on their guard.''
The owner of the New Zealand bank account had probably been scammed into becoming a "mule'', Mr Cocker said.
He recommended reporting anything unusual to police or directly to Netsafe.
