In today’s fast-evolving digital landscape, social media plays a vital role in shaping communication, commerce, and daily interactions. This significance is celebrated worldwide on World Social Media Day, observed every 30 June. However, alongside the many advantages social media offers, come new dangers: deepfakes.
As cybercriminals continuously evolve and adapt to new technologies, deepfake technology has become a significant concern, particularly on social media platforms. Fueled by rapid advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) and adoption of Generative AI (GenAI), deepfakes are blurring the line between reality and deception by mimicking real people with convincing videos and audio, raising serious concerns for individuals and organisations.
With GenAI traffic skyrocketing by over 890% in 2024 alone, this surge underscores the growing reliance on AI, not just as a technological innovation, but as a tool driving productivity, creativity, and decision-making. As GenAI tools become more accessible and user-friendly, anyone can now produce highly convincing deepfakes with little technical expertise or resources. Furthermore, through AI, attackers now can analyse public data to customise content for specific targets, making scams more persuasive and difficult to detect.
The lead in deepfake fraud
Cyber criminals are keenly aware of social media’s popularity and see it as fertile ground for exploitation. To put it in context, in 2024 alone, Singapore registered the highest year-on-year rise in identity fraud, all of which were driven by the surge of deepfakes.
The widespread use of social media, often combined with loose privacy settings, gives attackers easy access to personal and professional information. From fabricated videos of CEOs, news anchors, and political figures like President Tharman Shanmugaratnam to the recent law banning deepfakes ahead of GE2025, these AI-driven scams often appear as posts, messages, or comments on social media from trusted sources. This makes it more susceptible to deceive and engage targets, prompting them to take risky actions such as clicking on malicious links or providing sensitive information.
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Social media also serves as an entry point for organisational breaches, as attackers examine employees' public content to identify vulnerabilities related to their job roles, interests, or recent activities.
Fighting against online deception
As cyber threats become increasingly sophisticated, vigilance on social media is paramount. The key to staying safe lies in heightened awareness and proactive steps to secure online activities. Here are some vital strategies:
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- Scrutinise content thoroughly: Before sharing or clicking on links, users should closely examine the content for signs of manipulation. Watch for irregularities in facial expressions, lighting, or unnatural movements and speech patterns. Pay attention to AI-generated content labels, which platforms like TikTok and Meta now display. Such attention to detail can help you spot fake content before it causes harm.
- Verify sources: Always verify the authenticity of the source before engaging with any content. Even if a message appears to come from a trusted contact, double-check through another medium of communication to ensure its legitimacy.
- Manage social media privacy settings: Adjusting your social media privacy settings can reduce exposure to deepfakes. Limiting who can view and interact with your posts restricts the reach of malicious content and protects your personal information from being overly accessible.
- Educate yourself and others: Users should stay up to date on the latest cybercrime trends and actively share this knowledge within their networks. Staying informed is the first and most effective line of defence against AI-driven threats.
- Utilise security tools: While human vigilance is essential, advanced AI-powered tools—such as Precision-AI and machine learning—can serve as critical safeguards in today's digital landscape. These technologies use extensive, real-time security telemetry to assess the content, source, and reputation of websites and online material, helping to identify deepfakes, manipulated media, and other deceptive content. As misinformation becomes more sophisticated, integrating these tools provides individuals and organisations with a smarter, more proactive line of defence.
As AI technologies advance, so do the methods used by cybercriminals. By proactively verifying content, safeguarding privacy, and leveraging AI-powered security tools, we can better protect ourselves and those around us from the rising threat of AI-enhanced cybercrimes. In today’s digital world, staying aware and cautious remains our strongest defence against an evolving cyber landscape.
Lisa Sim is the vice president of Marketing for Asia Pacific and Japan at Palo Alto Networks
