TC Bulletin: Fraud & Closing Security https://tcbulletin.com/fraud Wire fraud and closing security coverage for transaction coordinators, with vendor data from CertifID and FundingShield corroborated against FBI IC3 reporting. en-us 2026 TC Bulletin desk@tcbulletin.com (TC Bulletin desk) Thu, 06 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT 60 Fraud flags have stayed above 40% of files for five straight quarters https://tcbulletin.com/fraud/fundingshield-flag-rate-five-quarters https://tcbulletin.com/fraud/fundingshield-flag-rate-five-quarters Thu, 06 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT Fraud & Closing Security wire-fraud title-and-escrow TC Bulletin Staff FundingShield's first-quarter screen flagged 43.72% of transactions in a $106.7 billion portfolio. That is an improvement on the record it set last autumn, and it is still four files in ten. FundingShield's first-quarter screen flagged 43.72% of transactions in a $106.7 billion portfolio. That is an improvement on the record it set last autumn, and it is still four files in ten.

Key points

  • FundingShield flagged 43.72% of transactions in a $106.7 billion portfolio in its first-quarter 2026 report.
  • Its third-quarter 2025 report flagged 46.6% of an approximately $90 billion portfolio, a record high and up 35% on the prior quarter.
  • That quarter averaged 3.1 issues per flagged transaction.
  • FundingShield screens its own client portfolio, so the rate describes files already under review, not the whole market.
  • The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center remains the independent counterweight to any vendor figure.

A transaction coordinator does not need a fraud statistic to know the closing week is the exposed one. It is the week the wire instructions move, the week five parties email each other in a hurry, and the week a plausible message from a familiar name is least likely to be questioned. What the last five quarters of FundingShield reporting add is a sense of scale.

The firm's first-quarter 2026 report flagged 43.72% of transactions in a portfolio it puts at $106.7 billion. That is down from the record set two quarters earlier: in the report published on 16 October 2025, FundingShield said nearly 46.6% of transactions in an approximately $90 billion portfolio were flagged for issues posing significant wire and title fraud risk, a rise of 35% on the previous quarter, with an average of 3.1 issues per flagged transaction.

The reported figures

  • Q1 2026 flag rate: 43.72% (Portfolio of $106.7 billion)
  • Q3 2025 flag rate: 46.6% (Portfolio of roughly $90 billion, a record high)
  • Issues per flagged file: 3.1 (Q3 2025 average)
  • Quarter-on-quarter change: +35% (Q3 2025 against Q2 2025)

What the number is, and what it is not

FundingShield screens files for its own clients. The portfolio it reports on is therefore a set of transactions that lenders and title firms already decided were worth checking, not a random sample of American closings. A flag is also not a loss. It records a mismatch worth resolving: a wire instruction that does not tie to a verified account, a closing agent whose licence or insurance does not check out, a party detail that fails validation.

Read that way, the figure is still useful to a coordinator. It says that on files where somebody bothered to look, something was wrong more often than not far short of half the time, quarter after quarter, across two very different rate environments. It does not say that four in ten American closings are compromised, and any story that says so is misreading it.

Where the independent number sits

The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center publishes the only figure in this area that no vendor has an interest in. Its 2024 annual report, released on 23 April 2025, recorded $16.6 billion in total reported losses, a 33% rise on 2023, including $2.77 billion attributed to business email compromise across 21,442 complaints. The 2025 report puts total reported losses at $20.877 billion across 1,008,597 complaints.

IC3 counts complaints, which means it undercounts: it captures what victims reported to the FBI, in the categories the FBI uses. Business email compromise is the category that covers the diverted-wire scenario a coordinator would recognise, and it is not real estate specific. Neither dataset alone describes the closing table. Together they bracket it.

How we handle vendor data. TC Bulletin reports vendor fraud statistics with the vendor named, the portfolio described, and the FBI IC3 figure alongside. We do not run a vendor number as a market-wide rate.

The practical read for a coordinator

  • Treat any change to wire instructions as a new instruction, not an amendment, and verify it by a phone number you already had on file.
  • The verification call happens before the file is touched, not after the client asks whether the email was real.
  • Log the verification in the file. Where a claim follows, the file is the record of what was done and when.
  • Send the fraud warning at the start of the transaction, when the client is still reading everything you send, not in the closing week when they are skimming.

Primary sources for this story

Sources cited

]]> One in five buyers gets a suspicious message before closing, CertifID survey finds https://tcbulletin.com/fraud/certifid-state-of-wire-fraud-2026 https://tcbulletin.com/fraud/certifid-state-of-wire-fraud-2026 Wed, 22 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMT Fraud & Closing Security wire-fraud title-and-escrow TC Bulletin Staff The 2026 State of Wire Fraud report surveyed more than 1,400 consumers and real estate professionals. Its sharpest finding is not the attack rate. It is that 56% of consumers would not use the same firm again. The 2026 State of Wire Fraud report surveyed more than 1,400 consumers and real estate professionals. Its sharpest finding is not the attack rate. It is that 56% of consumers would not use the same firm again.

Key points

  • CertifID's 2026 report surveyed more than 1,400 consumers and real estate professionals.
  • Roughly one in four parties to a transaction is targeted, and about one in twenty becomes a victim.
  • ALTA's coverage on 28 April 2026 reported that one in five homebuyers receives suspicious or fraudulent communication during closing.
  • 56% of consumers said they would not work with a title or real estate firm again after a wire fraud incident.
  • CertifID sells wire fraud prevention, so the survey is directional rather than neutral.

The number in CertifID's 2026 State of Wire Fraud report that should change a coordinator's process is not the attack rate. It is the aftermath: 56% of consumers said they would not work with a title or real estate firm again following a wire fraud incident. Whatever the recovery rate on the money, the relationship does not come back.

The report is built on a survey of more than 1,400 consumers and real estate professionals. It puts the share of transaction parties who are targeted at roughly one in four, and the share who become victims at about one in twenty. In its coverage on 28 April 2026, the American Land Title Association reported the finding that one in five homebuyers receives suspicious or fraudulent communication during closing.

What the survey reports

  • Respondents: 1,400+ (Consumers and real estate professionals)
  • Parties targeted: About 1 in 4
  • Parties victimised: About 1 in 20
  • Would not use the firm again: 56% (Consumers, following a wire fraud incident)

Read it as directional

CertifID sells wire fraud prevention. That does not make the survey wrong, and the company has been consistent about its methodology, but it does mean the report is a marketing artefact as well as a research one. Respondents to a wire fraud survey are more likely to have a wire fraud story. The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center is the number to place beside it before republishing anything.

Why the reputational finding is the operational one

Most closing-security guidance is written as loss prevention: verify the instruction, protect the funds. The 56% figure reframes it as client retention. A coordinator who sends the fraud warning early, verifies by phone, and documents the verification is not only protecting a wire. They are protecting the referral chain that the agent, the brokerage and the title firm all live on.

The money is sometimes recoverable. The client's willingness to send you the next file is not.

TC Bulletin, Editorial position

Primary sources for this story

Sources cited

]]> IC3 puts 2025 reported internet crime losses at $20.9 billion https://tcbulletin.com/fraud/ic3-2025-annual-report-losses https://tcbulletin.com/fraud/ic3-2025-annual-report-losses Thu, 16 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT Fraud & Closing Security wire-fraud TC Bulletin Staff The FBI complaint centre logged 1,008,597 complaints. For anyone covering closing fraud, it is the one figure with no product attached to it. The FBI complaint centre logged 1,008,597 complaints. For anyone covering closing fraud, it is the one figure with no product attached to it.

Key points

  • The IC3 2025 annual report records $20.877 billion in reported losses across 1,008,597 complaints.
  • The 2024 report, released 23 April 2025, recorded $16.6 billion, a 33% rise on 2023.
  • Business email compromise accounted for $2.77 billion across 21,442 complaints in 2024.
  • IC3 counts what was reported to the FBI, so it is a floor rather than a total.

There is no shortage of fraud statistics in the closing industry, and almost all of them are published by a company that sells something. The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center is the exception, which is why it belongs in every story that quotes a vendor number.

The 2025 annual report records $20.877 billion in reported losses across 1,008,597 complaints. The prior report, released on 23 April 2025 and covering 2024, recorded $16.6 billion, a 33% increase over 2023, of which $2.77 billion was attributed to business email compromise across 21,442 complaints.

The reported loss line

  • 2023: Baseline year for the 33% increase reported in the following cycle.
  • 23 April 2025: IC3 releases its 2024 annual report: $16.6 billion in reported losses, including $2.77 billion in business email compromise across 21,442 complaints.
  • 2026: IC3 2025 report: $20.877 billion in reported losses across 1,008,597 complaints.

Its limits are the point

IC3 counts complaints filed with the FBI. Victims who never report, who report only to a local department, or whose loss is absorbed by an insurer without a federal filing do not appear. Business email compromise is also a general category and not a real estate one, so the closing-table share is not broken out.

That makes IC3 a floor, not a total, and a floor is exactly what a vendor figure needs beside it. A screening firm reporting that it flagged four files in ten is describing its own book. IC3 is describing what people told the FBI happened to them.

Primary sources for this story

Sources cited

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