The Obituary Watch

Business Email Compromise (BEC) is the FBI's most costly cybercrime category — $2.7 billion in losses annually. Scammers are sophisticated, patient, and they read obituaries.

Here's how it works when a CEO dies:

  1. Scammer reads the obituary — identifies the company, the leadership vacuum
  2. Spoofs the CEO's email — or compromises it (it's probably still active and unmonitored)
  3. Emails the CFO or accountant — "I need you to wire $400k to this vendor for a deal I was closing before my illness. It's urgent. Keep this confidential."
  4. Staff, emotional and off-balance, comply without normal verification

The FBI has documented hundreds of these cases. The average loss is six figures. The success rate is disturbingly high, because dead CEOs can't deny sending the email.

The Leadership Vacuum Is the Attack Surface

In the days after a founder's death:

• Normal procedures are suspended • Decision-making authority is unclear • Staff are emotional and not thinking critically • IT oversight is reduced (the CEO may have been the IT decision-maker) • Email accounts remain active and potentially unmonitored

This is not a vulnerability in your firewall. It's a vulnerability in your organizational chart.

Cryptographic Proof of Death

Your staff needs to know — verified by cryptographic proof — that you are gone, and they need to know immediately.

ZeroLatch enables a "Succession Protocol":

  1. Create a vault with succession instructions
  2. Set recipient: your VP, your board, or your COO
  3. Include: "I have passed away or been incapacitated. Immediately: • Lock my email account (here are admin credentials) • Notify all staff via official channels • Enable heightened fraud verification for all financial transactions • Contact [lawyer name] at [number] for legal succession"

This arrives automatically. Before the scammers can act. Before the confusion sets in.