Fraud Statistics

Half of the general population have experienced an AI-related scam in the past year.

Half of all IRS scams come by phone call.

MrBeast appears in roughly 30% of impersonation scams tracked by Malwarebytes.

TsarBot targeted 450 banking apps and accounted for 58% of its global activity.

CopyBara targeted 446 banking apps.

Hook targeted 385 banking apps.

70% of young adults ages 18 to 22 experienced an AI-related scam in the past year.

50% of the general population experienced an AI-related scam in the past year.

24% of young adults have been a victim of an extortion scam.

72% of African member countries reported the presence of scam centres.

14% of reported cybercrime cases in Africa in 2025 involved identity theft and financial fraud.

15% of executives are targeted by social media imposter accounts.

36% of restaurants experienced fraudulent refund requests as a form of social engineering in the past year.

30% of restaurants experienced AI-generated voice or video impersonating executives to authorize fraudulent payments in the past year.

Adoption of AI-powered fraud detection grew by 71% year-on-year.

Detected threats increased by 77% as fraudsters use AI to scale and personalize harmful messaging.

44% of security leaders use AI-based solutions for threat detection and fraud prevention.

19% of adults aged 18+ in the United States, UK, Austria, Germany, and Switzerland have turned off voicemail recordings to prevent voice cloning.

85% of adults aged 18+ in the United States, UK, Austria, Germany, and Switzerland say it is hard to tell a scam apart from the real thing, up from 66% in 2025.

88% of adults aged 18+ in the United States, UK, Austria, Germany, and Switzerland say it is becoming harder to tell what online content is genuinely human or real.

Account-problems scams are the highest-volume scam type, with 74% of victims sharing high-value personally identifiable information (PII).

25.6% of identity crime victims managed two or more concurrent incidents, up from 23.5% the previous year.

62.1% of attempted misuse cases involved new account applications, and 37.9 percent involved attempted account takeovers.

14% of consumers report falling victim to a scam in the past year.

Approximately 5.2% of SMS messages (about 1 in 20) exhibit characteristics consistent with scam infrastructure or coordinated fraud activity.

More than 23 million incoming calls are classified as unwanted, meaning about 1 in 6 calls reaching protected devices is fraudulent or unsolicited.

FAMOUS CHOLLIMA doubled its operations using AI-generated identities to infiltrate cryptocurrency exchanges, fintech platforms, and consumer banks.

39% of Americans report being fraud victims.

61% of Americans aged 65 and older are aware of impersonation scams.

34% of Americans cite credit card fraud as their top concern.

51% of consumers are willing to pay for scam protection.

Nearly 40 million U.S. consumers report being scam victims in the past year.

19% of consumers report being scammed.

72% of small businesses experienced fraud, scams, or ransomware last year.

40% of affected small businesses say fraud hurts customer acquisition.

71% of small business owners expect AI to make fraud more prevalent.

81% of fraud prevention, risk, and compliance professionals report an increase in mule-related activity over the past year.

More than 80% of fraud prevention, risk, and compliance professionals report that mule activity is detected reactively rather than prevented before suspicious transactions occur.

78% of financial institutions make improving mule account detection a high or top priority over the next 12 months.

Total ACH payment value increased 11%, creating a nearly 5-to-1 divergence.