Fraud examiners anticipate future with generative AI, ACFE/SAS Report shows

Anti-fraud professionals across the globe expect generative artificial intelligence (AI) to be part of their fraud-fighting arsenals in the future, according to the 2024 Anti-Fraud Technology Benchmarking Report. In fact, an impressive 83% of respondents surveyed for the study anticipate that their organizations will add this technology to their anti-fraud initiatives over the next two years.

The anti-fraud technology study, a collaboration between the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE) and data analytics platform, SAS, surveyed 1,200 ACFE members in late 2023 about the technologies they and their organizations use in their anti-fraud initiatives. Now in its third edition, the report provides a detailed analysis of the current trends in fraud-fighting technologies and directions that organizations are looking to take with those technologies.

While stories of fraudsters carrying out schemes with generative AI proliferate in the news, the latest technology report from the ACFE and SAS underscores the pace of technological evolution and the strategic imperative for organizations to adopt a proactive and informed approach to integrating AI into their anti-fraud programs. Insight from this report shows that while fraud examiners are enthusiastic about generative AI — deep-learning artificial intelligence models used to produce almost-life-like images, videos, audio and text — there’s a lag between that enthusiasm and actual practice. Nearly one in five — 18% — of anti-fraud professionals say they currently use AI and machine learning (ML) in their work. And, according to the report, adoption of AI and ML for fraud detection and prevention has grown only 5% since 2019, when the anti-fraud technology report was first published.