The initial reaction when you suspect your computer or network has been compromised is to panic. However, if your network has been breached, what you do next can make the difference between the incident being a minor inconvenience and being a devastating disaster that brings legal trouble and huge fines and halts your ability to do business.

Now more than ever, we rely on technology to run our businesses and our lives. When the “Internet goes down,” most businesses come to a standstill until they are back online, costing thousands in lost productivity and sales. A perfect example would be the AT&T outage that happened a few weeks ago, when an estimated 1.7 million customers, including small business owners, lost service.

Horror stories of people getting scammed out of hundreds or even thousands of dollars aren’t in short supply. As we scroll through the news app from the comfort of our couch, reading these accounts of how a stupid so-and-so opened an obviously suspicious attachment and a hacker drained their bank account, it’s easy to say things like “I’d never fall for that!” But would you?

The sobering truth is that, under the right conditions and with the right threat, anyone can fall victim to a financially devastating scam.

Tax season is around the corner, which means so are tax scams. Without fail, every year, individuals and business owners alike fall victim to tax scams, resulting in the loss of substantial amounts of money and sensitive personal data. According to the Better Business Bureau, taxpayers lost $5.7 billion due to tax scams and fraud in 2022 alone.

What you are about to read is a real story showing you how a business can be devastated by cybercriminals in the blink of an eye. Most importantly, I’ll share several ways this could have been avoided. Make sure to forward this to anyone who might be making online payments and, better yet, your entire staff.