The Entrust Cybersecurity Institute released findings from its 2025 Identity Fraud Report. As cyber criminals continue to adapt their techniques to find new ways through defenses, AI-assisted fraud is growing increasingly sophisticated and frequent, as unveiled by the report.
The research findings reveal a deepfake attack happened “every five minutes in 2024,” while digital document forgeries increased “244% year-over-year.” Digital identity verification is a vital part of the onboarding process, essential for preventing fraud and financial crime. Deepfakes are the biggest growing threats going into 2025, according to the authors.
For the first time, digital document forgery “surpassed physical counterfeits as the leading method of fraud in 2024, with digital forgeries accounting for 57% of all document fraud.”
This marks a 244% increase from 2023 and a “1,600% surge since 2021 when almost all fraudulent documents were physical counterfeits.”
With the rise in AI-assisted fraud, bad actors are now able to leverage more sophisticated attacks “on documents, particularly National ID Cards (40.8% of attacks globally).”
Threat actors are taking advantage of “as-a-service” platforms for phishing, fraud, and ransomware that facilitate “knowledge sharing of “best practices” and the use of generative AI (GenAI) tools to create sophisticated digital forgery and injection attacks.”
The document identifies AI-assisted deepfakes as an area of particular concern for global organizations, as basic fraud tactics “that are relatively easy to discern, like phishing, are quickly giving way to hyper-realistic AI-generated deepfakes and synthetic identities.”
The rise in face-swap apps and GenAI tools has allowed fraudsters to perform and scale “increasingly believable biometric fraud attacks.”
The capacity for malicious usage is widespread and reportedly includes the following: fraudulent account openings, account takeovers, phishing scams, and misinformation campaigns.
Deepfake attacks occurred at a rate of “one every five minutes in 2024.”
Simon Horswell, Senior Fraud Specialist at Entrust said that this year’s data underscores this alarming trend, “highlighting how fraudsters are rapidly evolving their techniques.”
Horswell explained that these threats are “pervasive, touching every facet of business, government, and individuals alike.” He also mentioned that to stay ahead, security teams must proactively “adapt their strategies, prioritize monitoring these emerging threats, and prepare their organizations to face this new reality. It’s no longer optional; it’s imperative.”
Methodology
The 2025 Identity Fraud Report serves as a guide in order to identity fraud trends and techniques threatening businesses in 2025.
Via the Onfido digital identity verification solution, Entrust reportedly processes millions of identity verifications every year across 195 different countries.
The report reveals key insights gained on the state of remote identity fraud over the past year, based on “analysis of data collected from September 1, 2023 to August 31, 2024.”
Data has been “normalized” by client and industry distribution.
