98% of Orgs Face Identity-Related Threats, Driven by Deepfakes and AI Agents
A 2026 “The New Shape of Identity Threats” report by Regula (survey of 850 decision-makers) says identity-related threats are now a board-level concern. 98% of organizations worry about identity-related threats such as identity spoofing, deepfakes, and AI agents acting as users. In the past 12 months, 87% report AI actors attempting to pass identity processes.
Deepfakes lead the escalation. Respondents in the U.K. and Singapore are especially alarmed. The U.K. government estimated 8 million deepfakes shared in 2025 (up from 500,000 in 2023). Banking and crypto are both flagged as above average risk, including threats like account takeover and onboarding bypass. The report notes that deepfake concerns vary widely across industries, suggesting uneven adoption and awareness.
A key problem is visibility. 69% say AI-assisted tools are already common in identity flows, but only 39% have clear visibility into how and where AI is used. 87% report AI-assisted or automated actors attempting identity verification, while 26% already identify machine-operated actors acting for users. Yet AI agents rank as the least urgent threat in prioritization, implying organizations may be underestimating or misclassifying identity-related threats.
For traders, this matters indirectly: fraud and onboarding attacks can raise compliance and security costs for crypto platforms, but the report is not a direct market-moving catalyst. It mainly signals an evolving cyber risk environment that can affect exchanges, wallets, and on-chain identity infrastructure over time.
Neutral
This is a cybersecurity and identity-verification risk report, not a crypto-specific protocol change, regulation, or macro shock. So the immediate tradable signal for BTC/BCH/DOGE/BSV is limited.
Why neutral: the study quantifies rising “identity-related threats” (98% concerned; 87% reporting AI actors targeting identity checks) and highlights deepfakes plus AI-driven automation—factors that can increase fraud losses, KYT/KYC costs, and security budgets for exchanges, wallets, and onboarding providers. But the article does not describe any direct breach, token freeze, or on-chain technical event that typically causes abrupt repricing.
Short-term: traders may see a mild sentiment drag for centralized services if headlines around fraud/impersonation rise, but market-wide price impact is unlikely without concrete incidents.
Long-term: expect gradual demand for stronger identity, verification, and monitoring layers across fintech/crypto. This can indirectly support infrastructure vendors and push compliance/security spend upward—yet it remains a second-order effect rather than a direct driver of token flows.
Similar past pattern: whenever security-fraud narratives spike (e.g., waves of phishing or account-takeover incidents), prices usually react more to the presence of a specific major exploit than to general risk statistics. Here, the signal is informative but not an identifiable trigger.