While trust has always been essential, it’s quickly becoming the unseen currency of business. With rising consumer fear and anxiety around digital fraud year-over-year, getting this right will be critical in 2025.

Forward-thinking companies will make customer safety and protection central to their brand promise, creating seamless and engaging experiences that prioritize security and build deeper, more trusted customer relationships.

While it’s encouraging that more consumers are taking steps to protect their data, fraudsters continue to exploit any vulnerabilities. While educating users on password hygiene and social engineering scams remains crucial, as AI-driven attacks and deepfakes grow more sophisticated, businesses must act to stop threats before they reach consumers.

Leading organizations will strike this balance by using AI and machine learning to detect fraud in near real-time without disrupting the customer experience. Meanwhile, consumers will mostly accept appropriate levels of friction for added protection around their data.

On a larger scale, growing consumer concern will push for stronger privacy regulations, reshaping digital identity security. At the corporate level, businesses will focus more on account integrity, ensuring users are who they claim to be.

The threat of AI-enabled fraud is set to rise this year, with spear phishing, deepfakes, and account takeover (ATO) attacks at the forefront. To combat these threats, AI and machine learning-powered detection will play a critical role in predicting and preventing attacks before they cause harm.

Advanced intelligence will enhance threat detection, response times, and the overall efficiency of digital infrastructure.

Significant resources will focus on onboarding new users and verifying existing users’ identities to reduce fake accounts and curb the spread of misinformation and fraudulent content.

Reputational risks will intensify for individuals and organizations targeted by account takeovers and deepfakes shared in their names. Outdated cybersecurity measures and a lack of workplace awareness will also leave organizations increasingly vulnerable to deepfake fraud.

Organizations grappling with an ever-expanding set of vulnerabilities will struggle to keep pace with advancing technology, increasing sophistication, and the growing frequency of attacks. Data breaches will perpetuate a cycle of escalating risk, as compromised data fuels more account takeovers, phishing, and scams—leading to even more breaches.

Leading organizations will allocate additional resources to safeguard data, protect systems, and ensure business continuity.

Embracing security-by-design principles will become critical, with protections integrated into new products and software from the outset.

The cost of breaches will continue to surge, with a growing percentage of companies facing class action lawsuits post-breach, amplifying both financial and reputational pressures. Leadership attention and cross-functional collaboration will increase as organizations aim for more effective risk mitigation.