Around £400,000 has been stolen from an academy trust by fraudsters posing as a building firm, Tes has learned.
Schools are now being warned to tighten up the security of their IT systems “as a matter of urgency” as fraudsters look to exploit any weakening of internal controls during lockdown while staff are working remotely and “procedures may have slipped”.
Fraudsters are also targeting schools’ payroll systems, according to chartered accountants HWB, which says three academies out of the 36 that it audits in the south of England have fallen foul of fraudsters since the beginning of the pandemic - and have either lost money or assets.
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HWB director Michaela Johns said: “There are many complex moving parts within multi-academy trusts, of which there are nearly 1,200 in England.
Schools warned of fraud danger
“Among them are internal controls, which have become even more important during the pandemic when many staff are working remotely from home and procedures may have slipped.
“Fraudsters are seizing the opportunity to attack IT systems and get through the weaker processes that might be occurring during these times.”
The £400,000 fraud, which happened in spring last year, is still being investigated by the police and no arrests have so far been made, says HWB.
It only came to light when a genuine building firm contacted the trust to ask why it had not received its monthly payment, and it was discovered that fraudsters posing as the firm had sent a letter saying bank details had changed.
Ms Johns said fraudsters often used IT and phishing emails but that many schools’ security systems had stopped the attacks happening.
She said academies should “tighten up controls as a matter of urgency” and said payroll was another area targeted by fraudsters.
She said: “This tends to be an insider fraud. Many trusts outsource their payroll provision, but this is a good time for them to review processes if they get a new person on to the payroll.
“They need to check HR [human resources] is separate from finance - the new person coming on the payroll is an HR duty and running the BACS for the monthly payroll is a separate finance duty.”
The Department for Education has been contacted for comment.
