A Greenwich Village restaurant has closed its doors after a cyber-scam stole $45,000 from the establishment’s payroll, leaving the business with little means to sustain itself.
NYC’s Gotham Restaurant, which is celebrating its 40th year in business and was previously known as Gotham Bar and Grill, announced it will be closing until late August for a “summer pause,” as reported by Eater NY.
Co-owners and husband and wife, Bret and Cassandra Csencsitz, said the challenging decision to shutter temporarily was made after they were duped into sending payroll money to a “nefarious actor.”
The scam of the upscale restaurant began on May 10 when someone pretending to work for the company Gotham uses to administer payroll emailed Bret and his human resource staffer to tell them the firm was changing banking information because of “internal issues.”
The HR staffer contacted Bret to take a look at the request and combed through past emails to verify, and they didn’t realize it was fake until several hours later when it was too late.
“We fell victim to someone who was able to inject themselves into an ongoing dialogue between ourselves and a payroll company,” Bret told the NY Post.
The Csencsitz couple became co-owners when Gotham reopened after closing for two years due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Bret has contacted the bank since the theft, but the financial institute has not recovered the money as of yet. He also reported Gotham doesn’t have a cyber insurance policy, which costs $5,000 annually.
The Csencsitzes, who have since filed a report with the FBI, have warned other businesses to take out cyber insurance, and argue banks should do more to protect clients’ money.
“Please know that this was a difficult decision and it was not made lightly. Business levels and a recent cyber-deception incident that resulted in a large loss, made it necessary for us to pause operations to consider our options,” Bret told workers in a message explaining the temporary closure.
However, he asserts that he is not discouraged from opening again because of this setback, and plans to recover fully.
“We fully plan to reopen. We have capital committed, we haven’t received it yet but we will. We have very strong commitments and we’re gonna modify some things and be back with a new venue and a slightly modified dining room,” Bret said.
