How startup Gobbill’s fraud detection protects businesses from scams
How can you keep your company safe from scams?
We sit down with Shendon Ewans, CEO & Co-Founder of Gobbill – a bill payment automation system with a fraud detection component.
With increases in scams around Australia during COVID, the timing of this interview couldn’t be better.
Scammers have been thriving with the increase in people being online, receiving government payouts, and reorienting a new standard of living. They’ve taken advantage of people’s vulnerability and sense of urgency, averaging losses of about $6,000 per hit (Source: ACCC, August 2020).
In fact, Australians lost more than $12 million from more than 18,500 cyber scams in the month of July 2020 alone. Phishing scams are up by 44 per cent, and identity theft by 55 per cent compared to the same time last year (Source: ACCC Scamwatch, August 2020).
Disturbingly, scammers have positioned themselves as fake PPE suppliers, sending fake invoices to medical practices. Due to the urgency of requiring access to these supplies, many practices were paying these fake bills without properly checking them.
Unfortunately, most of these losses are unrecoverable and untraceable.
For Shendon and Gobbill, “the key here is to look after the people that are vulnerable.”
A few years before Gobbill started in 2015, Shendon’s retired father was scammed. “He’s not tech-savvy” and unfortunately, he clicked on an invoice attachment that had been sent to him in an ambiguous email. The link downloaded malware onto his computer, which secretly monitored his keystrokes over a period of time.
A month later, his bank account was emptied, his phone got ported, and credit card accounts were being opened up in his name. In addition to that, his pension was going into an account that his bank had frozen, meaning he couldn’t access his money.
This left Shendon’s father feeling embarrassed and ashamed - a common sentiment amongst older people who get duped. “We want to normalise this feeling by emphasising that anyone can fall for scams.”
As a result of his father’s experience, Gobbill emerged, with the aim of preventing others from falling victim to cyber attacks. It’s free for households to sign up, and small businesses are charged a minimal subscription fee.
Gobbill is also dedicated to helping people with disabilities, and is a registered NDIS provider.
The platform works by automatically paying your bills for you, and it can be synchronised with accounting systems, such as Xero - enabling you to continue to live a busy life without having to worry about missing any payment deadlines.
The best part about Gobbill is that it screens every invoice to safeguard people and businesses from fraud. It forensically extracts data from emails and invoices, and compares it to the information of legitimate suppliers, ABNs and accounts as listed in official registers.
Australian invoices can be paid when you choose, and via any payment method including bank account and credit/debit card. The user is always in control, and in the case of small businesses; data can be exported to help with audit and compliance requirements.
In the case of the medical practices that fell victim to scammers; Gobbill would have been able to screen out the fake PPE suppliers and invoices amidst the chaos.
Whilst these fraud figures are concerning, Shendon is enthusiastic in Gobbill’s ability to protect society’s most vulnerable, and leaves us with the following piece of advice: “Protect your cyber-selves by putting good cyber habits in place - it may save you one day.”
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