AI is supercharging financial fraud, leaving organizations underprepared, budgets stretched, and executives scrambling.
Something shifted in 2025: AI fraud scams evolved faster and became more convincing than previously seen by the fraud-prevention industry. Fraudsters appear to be winning with AI — and the people trying to stop them warn they’re ill-equipped.
That’s not a forecast. It’s the finding of a global survey by the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE) and data firm SAS released in March. It reveals that only 7% of anti-fraud professionals consider their organizations more than moderately prepared to detect or prevent AI-fueled deception, such as deepfake social engineering, generative AI document forgery, and digital injection attacks.
“AI is making the lives of cybercriminals orders of magnitude easier,” says Maria-Kristina Hayden, founder of cybersecurity firm Outfoxm and a former cyber intelligence officer at the US Defense Intelligence Agency. “It’s both enabling novel techniques and vastly improving the old ones.”
Companies and authorities are warning about the risks. “Perpetrators may use convincing websites, video calls, fake dashboards, and even AI-generated voices to build trust and imitate legitimate advisers or institutions,” according to a recent Deutsche Bank alert. In March, the Interpol Global Financial Fraud Threat Assessment sounded a louder alarm: “Fraud is no longer a peripheral threat; it is at the center of polycriminality, intersecting with organized crime, human trafficking, and cybercrime.” The global policing authority also warned that AI-enhanced ruses are 4.5 times more profitable than traditional methods.
Hayden notes that budget issues can stymie efforts to thwart schemes, as budgetary concerns often trump governance ones.
She advises that CFOs should be briefed on threat intelligence at least twice a month, while creating tools, policies, and a reporting culture that makes employees feel comfortable raising concerns.
The C-suite should rehearse responses to incidents like a suspicious CFO call or fraudulent wire transfer, before they happen, Hayden recommends. “Who calls the bank? What do we say to clients? Who briefs the board? This can all be ironed out before a real incident happens.”
The ACFE member survey warns that fraud is evolving faster than most organizations can defend against. More than half of respondents expect their organizations to increase their anti-fraud technology budgets over the next two years. Even so, most say financial constraints remain a problem.
