The morning after a major corporate closing in Fort Lauderdale, the wire room discovers that seven figures left the account on time, but the seller never received the money. People start pulling email threads, checking the wiring instructions, and asking who approved the transfer. Within hours, what began as a technical problem turns into a hunt for the person who “should have caught this.”
If you recognize that scenario, you are not alone. Business email compromise is targeting commercial and corporate closings across South Florida because those deals combine large dollar amounts, tight timelines, and heavy reliance on email. When wire instructions change at the last minute and everyone is focused on getting the deal done, process gaps create exactly the opening that fraudsters look for. By the time anyone realizes something is wrong, both money and trust may be gone.
At The Amlong Firm, we have spent nearly 40 years focused on employment law in Fort Lauderdale, helping employees and professionals protect their careers when something goes very wrong at work. In high-stakes incidents like business email compromise, we see how quickly the story shifts from “how did this happen” to “who do we blame.” This article walks through how BEC actually infiltrates corporate closings, where processes fail, and why written security protocols and real-world behavior often decide who bears both the financial loss and the employment fallout.
How Business Email Compromise Targets Fort Lauderdale Closings
Business email compromise is not a random virus that suddenly appears on a screen. It is a deliberate tactic in which criminals either gain access to a real business email account or create a convincing imitation, then use it to send or alter instructions that move money. In the context of a Fort Lauderdale corporate or commercial closing, that usually means wiring instructions, payoff details, or last-minute changes to account information. The attacker does not need to touch your internal systems. They only need someone in the process to trust the email.
To understand why closings are such a rich target, it helps to look at their communication map. In a typical Fort Lauderdale transaction, the buyer’s company, the seller’s company, one or more lenders, a title or escrow company, outside counsel on both sides, and internal finance teams all share information. Much of the coordination runs through email chains that grow longer and more chaotic as closing day approaches. Attachments are forwarded, addresses are added, and it is common for people to reply quickly from phones during meetings or while traveling.
At the end of that chain sit the wiring instructions that move the money. Parties may send initial instructions days in advance, then send updated or corrected versions by email as details change. Attackers study this pattern. Once they compromise an account or set up a spoofed address that looks nearly identical to a trusted party, they wait for the right moment. A carefully timed message that appears to be from the title company, a lawyer, or an internal executive, changing account numbers or confirming “revised” instructions, can slip into an already busy thread without raising suspicion.
Because we have handled complex employment disputes tied to Fort Lauderdale businesses for decades, we are familiar with these communication patterns. We see how the pressure, volume of email, and number of parties create a system where everyone relies on what appears in their inbox. Understanding that reality is the first step to seeing why BEC succeeds, and why pointing to a single employee as the problem often misses the real causes.
Where The Process Breaks: Failure Points In The Closing Workflow
From a distance, internal procedures for handling wires in corporate closings look solid. Many organizations say that wiring instructions must be verified, that changes need extra review, and that only certain staff can approve transfers. The breakdown rarely comes from the absence of any policy. It comes from the way people actually work when the deal is on the line and closing has to happen that day, not next week.
One of the most common failure points is reliance on unsecured email as the primary way to send, receive, and confirm wiring instructions. Even when policies say that changes should be verified by phone, staff may treat an email from a known contact as good enough, especially if it appears in a familiar thread. If the instructions say that the seller’s account changed or that funds must be split between accounts, people may assume that upstream parties have already checked the change. That assumption is exactly what criminals count on.
Time pressure magnifies the problem. On closing day in Fort Lauderdale, internal teams often juggle multiple transactions while senior executives and outside counsel demand quick answers. Under that pressure, even cautious employees may skip steps that feel like delays, such as looking up a phone number from a separate system and calling to confirm changes. Inside many organizations, there can also be an unspoken message that getting wires out on time matters more than strictly following every checklist item, especially when key players are waiting to fund or record documents.
Several specific process gaps create openings for BEC in this environment:
- Unverified changes to wiring instructions: Staff accept new instructions received by email without an independent call-back to a known, verified number.
- Lack of dual authorization for high-value transfers: A single person can both input and approve a wire, or approvals become a rubber stamp under time pressure.
- Ambiguous responsibility: No one knows clearly who is responsible for verifying instructions, so each person assumes someone else checked them.
- No secure delivery channel: Sensitive instructions are sent as ordinary email attachments rather than through a verified portal or encrypted system.
In the employment cases we handle, these process failures show up in emails, procedures, and interview notes long after the money is gone. They reveal that what happened was not a momentary lapse by one employee, but a system that made BEC possible. Recognizing these specific failure points is critical when determining where responsibility truly lies and when deciding whether an employee is being treated fairly in the aftermath.
Policies On Paper Versus What Employees Are Told To Do
Most mid-size and larger employers in Fort Lauderdale now have written information security policies. These policies often say all the right things. They may require call-back verification of wiring instructions, prohibit using public Wi-Fi for sensitive communications, and set out escalation procedures for anything that seems unusual. On paper, the organization looks well protected against business email compromise and other forms of fraud.
The reality on the ground is often very different. Employees responsible for processing wires or communicating with outside parties may receive only brief training on these policies, or training that is not tailored to closing situations. In day-to-day work, they take their cues from managers and co-workers, not from a binder or intranet page. If the culture rewards speed, flexibility, and “getting it done” more than careful verification, the written policy quickly becomes background noise.
We often see a sharp contrast between what a policy says and what employees are actually told to do under pressure. For example, an internal policy might require a call to independently confirm any change to wiring instructions. In practice, a supervisor under a deadline may say, “It came from the lawyer we always work with, just process it so we do not blow the closing.” When a loss occurs later, the employer may point to the written policy and claim that the employee failed to follow it, while ignoring the real messages that staff heard in the workplace.
This gap between formal rules and lived expectations becomes central evidence when BEC leads to an internal investigation or discipline. Policy manuals, training slides, and signed acknowledgements show what the company claims to require. Email chains, chat logs, and testimony from co-workers show what actually happens during a fast-moving Fort Lauderdale closing. Because our practice focuses on employment law, we know how to compare those two layers and show that an employee did not act in a vacuum. They acted inside a system that may have set them up to fail.
Who Gets Blamed After A Wire Fraud Loss, And Why
Once a business email compromise is discovered, the first question inside many organizations is not “Where did our controls fail,” but “Who clicked send.” Senior management, outside counsel, and insurers all understand that a large loss can have serious financial and reputational consequences. In that environment, it is unfortunately common for blame to fall quickly on the employee whose name appears in the wire request or authorization field.
The usual story sounds simple. An employee received fraudulent instructions, did not follow policy, and caused the loss. That narrative is attractive because it limits the problem to a single person. It allows leadership to say the system worked and that they have “addressed the issue” by disciplining or terminating the individual. However, this skips over deeper questions about who designed the process, who staffed and trained the team, and who decided that closing speed was worth the risk of shortcuts.
In a typical Fort Lauderdale closing, multiple decision makers have chances to prevent BEC. Executives approve staffing levels that determine whether there is time to verify instructions properly. IT and compliance teams propose or reject secure communication options. Managers set expectations, formally or informally, about how strictly policies are followed when deals are under pressure. Title companies, law firms, lenders, and internal finance departments all intersect at the same wire instructions. When we look at a case file, it is rare to find that only one person had any meaningful influence over what happened.
At The Amlong Firm, our 132 years of combined employment law experience help us recognize common patterns in these blame narratives. We know how to read internal investigation reports, emails, and interview notes with a critical eye. We ask why a particular employee was given certain responsibilities, what guidance they actually received, and whether others ignored warning signs or process weaknesses long before the fraud occurred. This deeper view often reveals that the “single mistake” story is incomplete at best and that systemic decisions played a much larger role.
Why Courts Care About Security Protocols, Not Just Hackers
When cases involving business email compromise reach courts or arbitrators, judges and fact-finders understand that a criminal was involved. The presence of a third-party hacker does not end the analysis. Instead, they tend to look closely at what the affected organizations did to prevent this kind of fraud and whether they followed their own rules. In many disputes over misdirected wires, the key questions are about reasonableness, foreseeability, and compliance with protocols.
Reasonableness often starts with whether a party had any meaningful controls in place. For example, a business handling large wire transfers in Fort Lauderdale is generally expected to have some process for verifying wiring instructions, especially when changes arrive by email. If there was no policy at all, or if the policy was so vague that employees had to guess what to do, that can influence how responsibility is allocated among the parties involved and how internal employment decisions are viewed.
Even when written policies look strong, courts frequently examine whether those policies were realistic and actually followed. If the policy required employees to call a known, verified number to confirm instructions, did the organization provide that number in an accessible way and train people to use it? If the policy required two approvals for certain transfers, did supervisors regularly approve wires without real review to meet closing deadlines? These questions go beyond “Was there a hacker” and focus on how the organization behaved before and during the incident.
Because we prepare our cases as if they will go to trial, we spend significant time assembling the documentary record that answers these questions. That includes policy documents, emails about training, internal memos discussing risk, and evidence of whether protocols were enforced or ignored in the rush to close transactions. While no firm can predict how any court will rule in a particular case, our litigation-focused approach is built around how judges and juries typically evaluate patterns of conduct, not just isolated events.
What Employees And Professionals Should Do After A BEC Incident
If you are the person whose name appears on the wire or who communicated with the party sending instructions, the hours and days after a BEC discovery can be overwhelming. You may be asked to write statements, sit for interviews, or surrender devices. You may sense that management, outside counsel, or insurers are looking to narrow the focus to your actions. In this environment, small decisions can have big consequences for your career and for any future legal claims.
One of the most valuable things you can do early is preserve information. Save all emails and attachments relating to the transaction, including drafts and side conversations. Keep copies of any written policies or procedures you were given about wires, closings, or information security. If instructions or expectations were communicated verbally, write down your memory of those conversations, including dates, participants, and what you were told about deadlines or protocol. Keep these notes in a secure place where they will not be altered.
Documenting the timeline is equally important. Make a record of when you received initial wiring instructions, when any changes arrived, who you consulted, and what verification steps you attempted. Note whether you raised concerns at any point, how supervisors responded, and whether you felt pressure to move quickly. These details can later help distinguish between following the environment you were placed in and acting outside any reasonable expectations.
Be cautious about signing statements that accept sole blame or that characterize your actions in legal terms without full context. Internal investigations often move quickly and may frame questions in a way that supports a pre-decided narrative. Before agreeing to written admissions or settlements that affect your employment, it can be wise to seek legal advice from someone who understands both BEC and employment law. Our work has shown that employees often underestimate how those early documents will be used later if the dispute escalates.
How The Amlong Firm Approaches Employment Fallout From BEC
When someone comes to us after a business email compromise in a Fort Lauderdale closing, we start by looking beyond the headline that they “processed a fraudulent wire.” We review the policies that allegedly governed their conduct, the training they received, the staffing and workload at the time, and the actual communications they had with supervisors and outside parties. Our goal is to understand the system they worked in, not just the one transaction that went wrong.
We then compare the employer’s official story to the documentary evidence. If the company claims that strict verification was always required, we look for emails that suggest speed was more important. If the employer says employees were fully trained on BEC risks, we examine attendance records, training materials, and follow-up communications. Where there are gaps between what the organization says and what it did, those discrepancies can be central to claims of wrongful termination, retaliation, or other employment violations that arise from the way a BEC incident is handled.
Our firm’s history is rooted in challenging unfair power dynamics in the workplace. Our founding attorney, Karen Coolman Amlong, was the first woman elected as a state legislator from Broward County, and The Amlong Firm secured Florida’s first multimillion-dollar sexual harassment judgment. That same commitment to workplace fairness guides our approach when employers or institutions try to protect themselves from a BEC loss by sacrificing an employee’s career or reputation.
With nearly 40 years in Fort Lauderdale and a legal team with 132 years of combined employment law experience, we are prepared to handle the complex mix of technical facts, corporate politics, and legal standards that follow a business email compromise. We approach these matters as if they will go to trial, which means gathering and analyzing the evidence needed to tell the full story of what happened, not just the part that appears in a quick internal report.
Protecting Your Career After Business Email Compromise
A successful business email compromise in a Fort Lauderdale corporate closing can feel like a perfect storm of technology, timing, and bad luck. In reality, these incidents usually expose deeper issues in how organizations design their processes, train their people, and enforce their own rules. If you are caught in the middle, your future should not depend on a simplified story that overlooks those systemic problems.
If you are being blamed, investigated, or pressured to accept responsibility for a BEC-related loss, you do not have to navigate that situation alone. Speaking with an employment law firm that understands both the mechanics of business email compromise and the way employers respond to it can help you protect your rights, your reputation, and your livelihood. We can review the policies, emails, and investigation documents with you and help you decide on a path forward.
Call (954) 953-5490 to speak with The Amlong Firm about employment fallout from business email compromise in a Fort Lauderdale closing.