ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI)- and deepfake-based fraud could target financial institutions and consumers in the Philippines, biometric solutions company iProov said.
“There is a massive increase at the moment in terms of identity fraud against systems using generative AI in particular and deepfakes… What we actually see for our customers is a massive rise in the use of deepfakes to try to spoof the identity of customers, both at account opening time, so when the identity is created, but also later to try to overtake those well-established accounts where the trust in the customer is high,” iProov Chief Technology Officer Dominic Forrest said in an online interview.
Bad actors have already started using AI and deepfake for fraud attacks in other Asian countries, Mr. Forrest said, citing a case in Hong Kong where an employee was scammed by fraudsters who used deepfake technology to recreate the voices and faces of their company’s top officials and staff in a video call.
To protect against these types of attacks, Mr. Forrest said Philippine regulators could mandate the use of national identity cards for financial accounts, similar to Singapore.
He said Philippine banks are well-equipped against potential cyberattacks as the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) has already implemented several cybersecurity-related regulations to ensure consumer protection.
“The Philippines is fortunate enough to have a regulator who is very forward-thinking in the terms of the rules they’re putting in place to protect the banks and the customers, or indeed, for the banks to do this in advance of the regulator. And we’ve seen that in some other geographies around the world,” Mr. Forrest said.
“I think the Philippine banks will have every right to be proud of being ahead of many countries in the region in terms of their general security posture,” he added.
Still, banks need to continuously invest in protecting themselves against new types of fraud as these could cost them consumer trust, Mr. Forrest said.
Firms like iProov can help lenders mitigate cyber threats through solutions that can detect deepfake attacks, he added. — A.M.C. Sy
