Phishing in Belgium: €93 million stolen in 2025

Picture this. Tuesday morning, 9:12. The accountant at an SME receives an email from her "CEO". Subject: urgent transfer for a new supplier. The tone is pressing, the logo perfect, the address identical to the real one except for one letter. She makes the transfer.

This kind of scenario is nothing unusual. According to Febelfin, fraudsters stole €93 million through phishing in Belgium in 2025, up from €49 million in 2024. And that is despite banks detecting, blocking or recovering a large share of fraudulent transfers (75% in 2024).

The scale of the threat in Belgium

The official figures are clear. In 2025, Belgians forwarded 9,929,354 suspicious messages to Safeonweb, around 27,000 a day. Thanks to these reports, the Centre for Cybersecurity Belgium (CCB) identified 176,183 malicious URLs and 40,815 domains. And the trend continues: more than 3.6 million reports in the first quarter of 2026, over 40,000 a day in February and March.

For organisations, the picture is just as clear:

• 635 incidents were reported to the CCB in 2025, 556 of them cyber-related. Account compromise was the most reported threat (144 cases). Part of the rise is due to new reporting obligations (NIS2, DORA).
• 19% of Belgian business leaders say they have already been targeted by a cybercriminal (Mastercard survey, May 2025).
• 1 in 4 European SMEs fears having to close after cyber fraud (same survey).

How it works: the most common techniques

The problem isn't that fraudsters are brilliant. It's that they always exploit the same human reflexes: urgency, authority and routine.

The variants keep multiplying and becoming more professional:

• CEO fraud: a scammer impersonates an executive to request an urgent transfer. The CCB lists this among the techniques observed in 2025.
• Spear phishing: highly targeted emails aimed at accounting or finance, built on information from LinkedIn or your website.
• Smishing and vishing: text messages in the name of bpost or calls impersonating IT support, exploiting trust in familiar channels.
• Current events and AI: according to the CCB, messages increasingly follow the news (pension reform, energy) and AI lets criminals produce convincing texts very quickly. Voice cloning also makes fraudulent calls more persuasive.

The 4 habits that protect your company

These habits aren't invented under pressure

They are practised. A targeted awareness session helps your teams recognise the warning signs before it's too late. We deliver lunch & learns, half-days or conferences, with scenarios tailored to your industry.