Hong Kong police revealed that artificial intelligence has once again been used for evil purposes. Finance staff at a multinational company were asked to carry out allegedly secret transactions by someone posing as the company's UK-based chief financial officer, after initial suspicions were dispelled by deepfake technology.
After receiving the phishing email, the accountant was invited to a video call with several other people who looked and sounded a lot like his colleagues. However, it was not really them, someone had used deepfake technology to just make them look like them.
However, the deception was enough to fool the victim, who wired approximately $25.6 million to the scammer. Hong Kong police said this was not the first serious use of the technology, with six people arrested in previous cases, but there was no sign that the person behind the latest robbery had been arrested.
The employee only discovered the transfer was a scam when he checked with company headquarters, CNN reported. After losing so much money, the company did not disclose any information and did not know the employee's current employment status.
Several of the people who tricked the employee into making video calls were imposters. This just goes to show how powerful technology is, and why regulating these emerging technologies is critical.
The U.S. election, due later this year, is likely to be a prime target for deepfake-related disinformation campaigns, so it’s important for large tech companies like Meta to issue appropriate warnings to users to help slow the spread of deceptive content.
There are steps users can take to detect deepfakes, including mismatching facial features, verifying information with trusted sources, and paying attention to strange lighting, shadows, or head movements.