The firm that lost $25 million to deepfake video scammers in Hong Kong earlier this year has been revealed to be UK-based engineering firm Ove Arup. Ove Arup is known for world landmarks, including the Sydney Opera House. The company employs roughly 18,000 people worldwide and has annual revenues of over £2 billion.
Early warning signs of deep fake trend
In early February of this year, Cyber Intelligence reported that an as-yet-unidentified firm in Hong Kong had been defrauded of roughly US$25 million by criminals using deepfake video technology to pose as the company’s corporate finance officer (CFO) and other trusted colleagues. Not knowing how sophisticated even off-the-shelf deepfake video has become, the staff member who had been targeted was totally duped by what he logically assumed must be his CFO asking him to make the $25 million transfer during the course of an entirely fake but highly convincing video conference. When the attack was originally reported, the Hong Kong police gave a stark warning:
“We want to alert the public to these new deception tactics. In the past, we would assume these scams would only involve two people in one-on-one situations, but we can see from this case that fraudsters are able to use AI technology in online meetings, so people must be vigilant even in meetings with lots of participants,” said Hong Kong police senior superintendent, Baron Chan Shun-ching.
Face swaps are the deepfake of choice for cybercriminals
Few employees in any organization could have been fully prepared for the sophistication of a scam that deepfaked their CEO and other colleagues in a video conference. But, according to biometric vendor iProov, face swaps are now firmly established as the deepfake of choice among persistent threat actors.
“Tools such as DeepFaceLive, Swapface, Deepswap, and Swapstream.ai are easily accessible to anyone, including attackers. The fact that most of these tools offer a free tier for users to experiment with makes it even easier for attackers to abuse them without spending any money. This further emphasizes the need for stronger security measures to protect remote verification systems against such attacks,” says iProov’s Threat Intelligence Report 2024.
