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Inside the Fraud Threat: What Every Leader Should Know

Author

Russ Anderson, CFE
Head of Fraud Prevention and Compliance Solutions
LIMRA and LOMA
randerson@limra.com

November 2025

Fraud has fundamentally changed the way companies operate. Through the first half of 2025, there was a 30 percent year-over-year increase in account takeover (ATO) incidents as compared to the first half of 2024. This is on top of a 212 percent increase in 2024 over 2023. So far in 2025, fraudsters have requested an average fraudulent disbursement of $80,000 from an average account valued at $166,000, according to the 2025 FraudShare second quarter statistics. That is why it’s imperative for all your employees — whether directly involved in fraud and compliance or not — to understand the threat of fraudsters, know their customers, and stay current on the latest schemes.

Bad Actors

There are a variety of fraud schemes that have exploded in popularity in recent years, with account takeovers topping the list as 61 percent of companies experienced more ATO attempts in 2024 than in years prior.While these ATO schemes vary in complexity and approach, they all impersonate your customers in some way to fraudulently withdraw their funds, allowing more attempts to be successful.

The growing ease with which fraudsters impersonate others introduces artificial intelligence (AI) uncertainty into the broader conversation around fraud. As of 2024, 30 percent of organizations have faced attacks where AI was used to alter or impersonate a voice, posing a substantial threat to voice-based authentication and communication.Additionally, 25 percent of organizations have seen AI used to create or modify fraudulent correspondence like letters and emails.These types of fraud attacks show us that fraudsters are becoming increasingly sophisticated with their phishing and social engineering attacks and utilizing AI and other new technologies to do so.

AI-related fraud trends underscore the evolving methods bad actors are leveraging to target organizations. Fraud tactics such as documentation replication, higher-volume attacks, and more frequent attacks will continue to rise. Because of this, companies must stay vigilant and adopt advanced security measures and implement educational tools to counteract these AI-driven threats. However, fraud prevention can evolve with the help of AI too, through enhanced analytics, faster detection and response, and quicker and more thorough investigations.

Elder financial exploitation is also a major area of concern for our industry. In 2024 alone, $4.9 billion was reported in financial losses for this group of Americans. This financial loss also coincided with a 46 percent increase in complaints related to fraud, a 43 percent increase in losses compared to the previous year, and an average loss of $83,000. Elder exploitation can come from a plethora of sources — including friends and family, government agent impersonations via AI, and other deceptive tactics and tools. As technology like scam bots becomes more prevalent and sophisticated, AI will continue to play an even larger role in the financial exploitation of older adults.

While account takeover, AI, and elder exploitation may be the biggest topics that come to mind when thinking about fraud attempts, insider threats and employment scams also remain significant threats. Insiders may include employees, contractors and third-party vendors — all of whom can gain access to “insider” information. They likely know your procedures and controls, and have access to your systems, sources and customer records.

Insider Threats

Insider threats can be more difficult to recognize and combat early on. Fraudsters can blend into the background of everyday work at your organization, slowly learning the information needed to be successful in their attack. Understanding who you’re hiring and working with is crucial to keeping your company and customers safe.

Protecting company and customer assets is always top of mind for leaders everywhere. When it comes to recognizing and combating fraud, there is no silver bullet. Rather, it’s a combination of knowing and understanding your fraud risk, and balancing the right tools, technology, and training to stay vigilant. When you have well-trained employees, it’s much harder for fraudsters to break through with a successful fraud attack.

Combating Fraud Together

Collaboration across the industry is also key when working to combat fraud and protect your company. When we think of one another as peers rather than competitors, we can work together to identify emerging fraud risks and create a safer industry for all.

According to 2025 FraudShare second quarter statistics, 70 percent of ATO attacks successfully accessed the targeted account.The threat of fraud is not going away; however, the way you protect your organization and people is key to combating the rise and sophistication of fraud attempts.

When your company is prepared, it can keep customers safe. November 16-22 marks the 25 th anniversary of International Fraud Awareness Week, when companies from around the world come together to support fraud awareness, education and prevention.

In conjunction with this effort, LIMRA’s fraud and compliance team created a six-part consumer fraud guide to help organizations protect themselves and their customers from fraudsters. Our full suite of fraud prevention and compliance solutions offers a variety of tools that can educate, recognize and combat financial crimes. Furthermore, as an effort to create more educational opportunities to learn about the dangers of fraud, LIMRA introduced its first fraud course on Industry Advantage, focusing specifically on account takeovers.

Our work combating fraud does not stop here. We’ve partnered with Verisk to develop FraudShare 2.0 — a new approach to recognizing and stopping fraud throughout the industry. FraudShare 2.0 is the only cross-carrier fraud prevention solution built specifically for the life insurance industry — combining peer intelligence with Verisk’s advanced analytics and technology to proactively identify, prevent and mitigate fraud.

Conclusion

The prevalence of fraud will continue to permeate our industry if we do not work together and understand how fraudsters operate. By protecting your organization through education and awareness of the latest trends and schemes, you can better prepare your teams to be on the lookout for fraudsters.

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