Google and Facebook confirm scam which cost companies $100m

A Lithuanian man was charged last month after an email phishing attack which was reported to have cost two internet companies a combined $100m. Google and Facebook confirmed on Friday that they were the companies affected.

Evaldas Rimasauskas (48) is reported to have posed as an Asian manufacturing firm, including the creation of invoices, email accounts and contracts, to scam the firms from the sum of money.

A Lithuanian man was charged last month after an email phishing attack

"We detected this fraud against our vendor management team and promptly alerted the authorities," a spokeswoman for Google said in a statement. "We recouped the funds and we're pleased this matter is resolved."

Facebook also acknowledged the scam on Friday, but did not reveal the extent of the attack.

"Facebook recovered the bulk of the funds shortly after the incident and has been cooperating with law enforcement in its investigation,” a spokesperson said.

The US Department of Justice confirmed the scam in March, saying that the two firms were tricked into wiring the money to the man.

"Fraudulent phishing emails were sent to employees and agents of the victim companies, which regularly conducted multimillion-dollar transactions with [the Asian] company," the US DoJ said.