Deepfake statistics 2026: key facts for CFOs and finance leaders

Only 15% state that they have never encountered a deepfake video.

In a 2025 study of 2,000 UK and U.S. consumers, participants were explicitly told to watch for synthetic content and were still 36% less likely to correctly identify a fake video than a fake image.

Deepfake-enabled fraud is now one of the most common third-party fraud types Sumsub tracks, alongside synthetic identity use and account takeover.

The average financial burden of deepfake-related identity fraud grew from $230,000 in 2022 to $450,000 in 2024, a 96% increase in two years. Nearly half of businesses globally now report being targeted by audio or video deepfake fraud.

Avast's Q1 2024 Threat Report highlights a rise in cyberthreats exploiting human manipulation tactics like deepfakes and AI-manipulated audio, particularly on platforms such as YouTube.

Despite AI's growing prominence, about one in four company leaders had little to no familiarity with deepfake technology.

31 percent of business leaders believe deepfakes have not increased their fraud risk.

32 percent of leaders had no confidence their employees would be able to recognize deepfake fraud attempts on their businesses.

More than half of leaders say their employees haven't had any training on identifying or addressing deepfake attacks.

A further 10% were unsure if their enterprises had fallen victim to deepfake-based cyberattacks.

The gap between awareness and preparedness is stark: most leaders recognize deepfakes as a threat, but 61% of executives say their companies haven't established any protocols for addressing deepfake risks.

This is a global figure from a survey of 302 cybersecurity leaders, not a projection.

Sumsub measured this between Q1 2024 and Q1 2025, alongside a 311% rise in synthetic identity document fraud across the same region.

This projection reflects a compound annual growth rate of 32% from US$12.3 billion in 2023, and remains the most-cited reference figure for this category.

Injection attacks, where synthetic media is fed directly into a verification system rather than shown on camera, rose 40% year over year.

This figure comes from a 2025 survey of cybersecurity leaders.

35% experienced the same on a video call. This is a separate, more recent Gartner survey from the 62% figure used earlier on this page and should not be blended with it, since the two measure different things.