FinTech Magazine September 2024 | Page 137

TECH & AI

How important is it for fintechs to stay at the cutting edge of cybersecurity innovation , using AI to stay one step ahead of fraudsters ? How can they do it , and what more needs to be done ?

Adam Davies : Banks and fintechs are locked in a race against the fraudsters , a race that ’ s moving more quickly every day . Fraudsters are using new technologies like Generative AI to increase the speed of their attacks , defeat authentication and socially engineer / scam customers at a scale we ’ ve never seen before .
Fintechs have to match that speed and make fraud decisions increasingly quickly , with real-time decisions becoming table stakes to stay ahead of criminals .
Fintechs also need to use all the available data to identify anomalous behaviour that might indicate fraud . Whether they ’ re extracting context from internal data , or bringing in external data , all those relevant signals can help make an informed decision about whether something is fraudulent or legitimate .
Finally , fintechs need the agility to react as fraud types and channels change . Using technology that allows nimble orchestration and the rapid modification and deployment of new fraud-fighting strategies is essential given the very dynamic nature of fraud threats .
Relying on static rules or offline detection will only make a fintech a target for sophisticated fraudsters .
Grigory Yusupov : We are already witnessing how developments within Artificial Intelligence ( AI ) are having some adverse effects on cybersecurity . The extraordinary leaps in AI technology mean it ’ s now almost too easy for a fraudster to carry out financial crimes .
As AI develops further , social engineering attacks on organisations will become easier and faster because cybercriminals no longer need deep technical know-how to execute them .
Particularly , advancements in generative AI mean deepfake technology can now be used to create hyper-realistic fake documents and videos used to commit financial crimes and fraud . The frightening accuracy of deepfakes means that document forgery is likely to become easier than ever before , with accurate information harder to spot by the naked eye .
To combat these AI-aided advances of cybercriminals , organisations will need to fight fire with fire by leveraging AI themselves to stay one step ahead .
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