Authorities warn of online financial transactions scam

Crime-fighting authorities have issued a warning to individuals and business to be on the lookout for a scam involving online financial transactions.

According to cyber crime officials, it is a “man in the middle” scam, whereby an unauthorized third party accesses an individual’s or a business’s sensitive data as it is being sent over the internet.

Using this information, the so-called “man in the middle” – the unauthorized third party – gets in between the sender and the recipient of the data and can divert payments into accounts of his or her choice.

Authorities decided to issue the warning, along with a set of guidelines, after a spike of cases employing this method were reported.