46% of surveyed organizations reported experiencing fraud, corruption, or other economic crimes in the last 24 months. Those odds are a clear indication of the importance of fraud awareness initiatives. While protecting against fraud is a round-the-clock requirement, International Fraud Awareness Week encourages us to know the facts, evaluate the health of our own security protocols, and stay up to date with current recommendations.
What Is International Fraud Awareness Week?
International Fraud Awareness Week, observed this year from November 13-19, is the global effort to minimize the impact of fraud by promoting anti-fraud awareness and education. The intent is to educate business owners, managers, and employees about what fraud is, how to recognize it, how to protect against it, and why working together to stop it is vital.
What is Fraud?
Fraud is an act of deception for personal gain or the intent to cause loss to someone else. It is a criminal offense. If we don’t invest in fighting fraud, it will still cost your business financially, affecting every employee and your bottom line.
Types of Fraud
Fraud appears in many forms. One common type of fraud is identity theft, which can happen when printed documents aren’t protected from unauthorized individuals. Whether or not those individuals choose to use the information on those documents for personal gain, your business is legally liable for the data breach, can be fined by the government, and must notify everyone affected by the breach. If affected individuals experience loss as a result of the data breach, the legal action and related costs could result in disaster for your company.
Documents that aren’t properly destroyed at the end of their lifecycle provide tempting opportunities for identity thieves. To thwart fraud, avoid these common errors:
Tossing documents straight into the garbage or recycling bin. Instead, follow a “shred everything” policy, having all paper professionally shredded. This includes handwritten sticky notes, scrap paper, junk mail, anything with an address label, banking receipts, travel documents, receipts, and more. Thieves will utilize a combination of information from different documents to apply for credit cards, driver licenses/government ID cards, withdraw money from bank accounts, apply for benefits and obtain healthcare services, and much more.
DIY shredding seems like the perfect solution, however, the machines themselves and especially the process involved in in-house shredding still leaves you wide open to fraud. Even if your employees overcome the desire to avoid the frustrating, noisy, tedious shredding machine, thieves are perfectly willing to reassemble the shredded paper in your dumpster to find the information they are looking for. Instead, documents should be shredded beyond recognition using industrial-strength equipment and the shredded paper mixed with thousands of pounds of shredded paper from other sources so reconstruction is impossible.
Not protecting documents from the moment they are created to the moment they are destroyed. By following document security best practices, a “shred everything” policy, and partnering with a reputable shredding company, you can protect information throughout its lifecycle. The right shredding provider will provide you with locked shred collection containers to toss documents and whole files into with no need to remove staples, paperclips, or file folders. Simply drop into the locked container where it is kept secure until a mobile shredding truck destroys it on site at your business on a schedule tailored to your needs.
Don’t store or dispose of any obsolete hard drives, electronic storage media, or other electronics. Thieves can recover sensitive information on these, even if the data has been erased. Have these devices shredded by an e-destruction service to ensure that your digital information is protected along with your hard copy documents.
International Fraud Awareness week is the perfect time to take action and protect your business, clients, and employees from data theft.
Wiggins Shredding provides secure, mobile shredding and destruction services to the businesses and residents of Pennsylvania and Tri-State Maryland, Delaware and New Jersey. Give us a call at 610-692-TEAR(8327) or by complete the form on this page to tell us about your needs. Our friendly shredding experts are standing by!
Wiggins was awesome!! The truck arrived when they said it would. Two gentlemen attended to the shredding. They helped load the bins, and 15 years of business files were shredded in 20 minutes from start to finish. I will call them again, and recommend to anyone who needs shredding services.
I raced to Wiggins Shredding with 5 minutes to spare before they closed. I could've been turned away, but the staff graciously accepted the 5 or 6 bins worth of papers I delivered. It was a huge relief to get that done that day, for me, my cousin, and my aunt. Thank you very much!
We used this Company and I dealt with Christine and she was polite and prompt to get back to me. The company was efficient and charged exactly what I was quoted. The gentlemen that came were also polite and efficient and quick. I would recommend this Company and dealing with Christine to anyone.
Service was great. They were on time, they carried 15 boxes of papers from my basement with no complaints. It was good to see the papers being shredded right in front of me. Great service I would not hesitate to use this service again.
Hi Chrissy – Just a quick note to thank you and the entire team for a first-class Wiggins Shredding experience this morning. Garrett and Milton were real pros and super-efficient. We look forward to using you again in the future.
Wiggins Shredding called ahead to let us know they were on their way and they arrived as scheduled. The two guys were very efficient, courteous, and helpful. Great job. Whole process was complete in about fifteen minutes for about 20+ boxes of files. We will use Wiggins Shredding again for future file purging.
Wiggins Shredding Service was professional from start to finish!All the employees we spoke to by phone and on site arrival wereso helpful and courteous. Great experience-Great Company!
We do an annual shred event and always use Wiggins. Both the service team in the office and drivers they send out are professional, courteous and helpful. The best!
Recently we had Wiggins Shredding Service come on sight. The process was seamless and the gentlemen that work for Wiggins were so kind and accommodating. It was such a pleasurable experience. I highly recommend this company
I recently used Wiggins Shredding for my shredding needs and was thoroughly impressed with their service. From the initial phone call to the completion of the job, everything was handled with professionalism and efficiency. The team arrived on time and immediately got to work, ensuring that my confidential documents were securely destroyed. Overall, I highly recommend Wiggins Shredding for any shredding needs.
From Start to Finish Wiggins Shredding and Chrissy Weber were very professional. They were able to give me a great quote for getting rid of our old and unwanted documents and were able to beat all other quotes I received. They were very easy to contact and were extremely helpful in answering all my questions, promptly. I Highly recommend them and I will be using them in the future.
What a lovely group of people to work with. Professional, efficient and organized. They made one part of moving our corporate offices to fully remote much easier. Thank you
Our company uses Wiggins Shredding annually. We've never had any issues with their service. Their staff is courteous and they are here and gone in very short amount of time.
We had Wiggins Shredding yesterrday and Wow, what an operation. Shredded 9 containers in about a half an hour. Reasonably priced as well. They took the headache of what to do with 16 years of files away and made it look easy. I strongly recommend them.
First time user, and we were very pleased. Scheduling was easy and quick. The guys were great, they came right on time, and got right to it. Everything went very well. Thank you for a job well done!
Arrived on time, called in advance to notify us , crew was courteous and professional, price quoted was price charged which was way more reasonable then others , a pleasure to work with this company and highly recommended!
Great company to works with. Everyone I spoke with was very professional. Ms. Demarco was amazing to work with and very patient with everything my agency required.
The gentlemen were very courteous. They arrived a little early which was great for my schedule. They were really nice people. This is my 3rd year using Wiggins Shredding and I have absolutely no complaints. I would refer them to anyone. Thank you Wiggins for being so prompt and sending two really nice guys who also loved petting my dog. She loved it too. Thank you!
I contacted Wiggins to get a quote for shredding. Chrissy was very helpful and explained the process and cost. Chrissy had me scheduled the following week. The two men that came out to our office were very neat, clean and extremely professional. They shredded 27 bank boxes of files so quick! We were able to see the shredding in our parking lot! I would highly recommend Wiggins Shredding!
So fast and efficient. Can't believe I put this off for as long as I did. It was so easy start to finish. Office staff & crew that came out were great. Highly recommend...and will be calling them for our next shred!!
Lea Gordon, Business Manager Berks County Visitors Bureau. I would highly recommend Wiggins Shredding to everyone. I have been very pleased with everyone at this company. They worked with us and I find their employees to be kind, courteous and very helpful. We will be using them again in the future!
My parents needed to purge documents before a big move across country, so I called Wiggins Shredding. Christine was very helpful and accommodating. Since we were outside of their regular service area, she even suggested I shop around and call back. The service itself took itself was so quick, professional, and friendly. This is a top notch service for the area. I can't recommend it enough!
We used Wiggins Shredding for a company purge as we are moving out of our office. Natalie was so helpful with our questions ahead of time, getting us a quote, and scheduling the pickup. The team called to let us know they were 30 minutes away. They were so nice and finished the job very quickly. It took so much effort off of our plates, and the pricing was so reasonable. I highly recommend!
I have to say how impressed we were with the service provided. The guys were completely professional, kind, worked quickly, and helped us get rid of a monumental undertaking. Christine in the office worked patiently with us as we asked a million questions and she got this ball rolling--all the way to a cleaner, more organized office! Thank you all for terrific service!
Process could not have been easier. Easy request for pricing. Easy payment methods. Easy scheduling. Thank you for your efficient service. Highly recommend!
Such an easy process! Everyone was so friendly, professional and efficient. Having them come to the home was so convenient. I had everything in the garage, and it took them less than 10 minutes to dump everything into the shredding truck.
Your employees are highly professional as well as exercising a great deal of patience towards the customers. Our Agency is grateful for the prompt timeliness of the driver; these considerate actions made our experience with "Wiggins Shredding, Inc." a great one!!We will continue our business with this shredding company again soon. Thank you for providing excellent customer service.
Wiggins shredding did a great job with helping us shred years worth of material. Scheduling was easy and they arrived on time. It took less than 20 minutes to complete what would have taken us hours to do.
Absolutely great service, friendly and very courtesy and on time...which says a lot and company is very easy to deal with and is on top of all calls and prompt in responding to calls.Highly recommended!!!From Iris T