Deepfakes Are Becoming a Costly Reality for Businesses, Report Warns

The useful part

The 2026 Pindrop Deepfake Readiness Index, published on 28 September, warned there is a significant gap between the threat of deepfake attacks and enterprise readiness to defend against them. The technology has become increasingly sophisticated, making it difficult for anyone watching or listening to the deepfake to tell that it isn't footage of a real person. Cybercriminals have turned to deepfakes as part of hacking and fraud campaigns.

How it works

• It has even been known for North Korean nation-state hackers to use deepfakes to pose as fake IT workers looking for jobs to get hired by technology and software companies.
• The financial cost of deepfake attacks included direct losses, as well as the costs associated with remediating the incident, as well as the time and resources it took staff to work in response to the attack.
• Deepfakes turn our most instinctive signals of identity, a familiar face and voice, into an attack surface," said Elie Khoury, SVP of research at Pindrop.
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What to take from it

Pindrop's survey of over 250 US security leaders found that 74% said they have encountered a suspected deepfake attack in the last 12 months. Of those, one in four reported losses of over $1m because of a single incident, while nearly half (49%) of those hit by deepfake attacks reported losses of $500,000. Meanwhile, 93% of security leaders expressed concern that their organization is not currently prepared to face the threat posed by deepfake attacks.

Example or evidence

• They are used to pose as someone like a colleague, their boss or their CEO and trick victims into sharing sensitive information or making a fraudulent financial transfer.
• "Attackers have figured out that one of the easiest ways around sophisticated security controls is to impersonate the human those controls are designed to trust.
• "Enterprises need to bring the same rigor used to secure systems and devices to the live human interactions where critical decisions are being made," he added.
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Details worth keeping

Deepfakes Are Becoming a Costly Reality for Businesses, Report Warns. Deepfakes are AI generated audio and videos of people. According to the report, three in four respondents said that it would take a company leader being impersonated in – or fooled by – a deepfake attack before the deepfake cybersecurity challenge deepfakes becomes a board level or leadership issue.

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