A finance approver joins a video call with a voice and face that look like the CFO, or takes a call that sounds exactly like a known executive, and authorizes a payment that never should have moved. A widely reported multimillion-dollar deepfake wire-fraud incident at a global firm put this on every board risk agenda, and cyber insurers now ask what you have done about it. The AI Deepfake / Social-Engineering Defense Readiness Assessment is a fixed-scope engagement that maps your exposure across the transaction flows an attacker would target, reviews the verification and approval controls that would stop a synthetic-identity attempt, and hands your leadership a board-ready report with prioritized control gaps. It is advisory readiness work you own, not a covert test of your staff and not a guarantee against fraud.
Part of the AI Security & Cyber Risk practice · fees fixed in writing after scoping. See engagement models.
This is an advisory readiness assessment, not a covert test. We map your deepfake and social-engineering exposure across high-value transaction flows and review the process controls that reduce it, then hand back a prioritized report. It is explicitly not covert social engineering of your staff, not unauthorized access to any system, and not ongoing detection or monitoring. It does not guarantee that your firm cannot be defrauded. For ongoing deepfake and voice-fraud detection tooling, DSE orchestrates a vetted MDR or detection partner on your behalf and does not run that monitoring itself. The findings and the roadmap are yours to own; we work alongside your fraud, treasury, security, and counsel teams.
Deepfake fraud does not attack a model. It attacks a moment of trust in a process, a payment approved on a convincing call, an identity accepted on a video that looks right. We work each high-value flow and the controls that stand between an impersonation attempt and money leaving the firm.
The core target. We map how a wire or high-value payment is requested, approved, and released, where a single approver can act on a call or a video request, and whether the process requires an independent, out-of-band confirmation before funds move. This is the flow a synthetic-executive attempt is built to exploit.
Beyond one wire, we look at treasury and cash-management operations: account changes, funding transfers, and the authority thresholds that decide when a second person or an out-of-band check is required. We surface where speed pressure or an urgent request can override the step that would catch an impersonation.
Attackers call the help desk sounding like a real employee to reset credentials or move a device. We review the challenge-response and identity-verification procedures the help desk uses, and whether a confident, well-scripted caller (or a cloned voice) can talk past them into an account.
The people who act on an executive's behalf are a favored entry point. We map how executive support staff receive and act on instructions, whether an urgent request that appears to come from a principal can bypass normal approval, and the out-of-band confirmation that should gate a money-moving or access-granting instruction.
A request to change a vendor's bank details is a classic fraud vector that a deepfake voice or video makes more convincing. We review how payee and banking-detail changes are requested and verified, and whether a callback to a known, pre-established contact is required before any change takes effect.
Controls only work if people use them under pressure. We assess whether staff in these flows have had any awareness training on deepfake voice and video fraud, whether they know it is legitimate to pause and verify an executive request, and whether there is a clear, blame-free path to escalate a suspicious call.
The value is a rigorous, well-documented read on your exposure and controls that your leadership can act on. Being precise about where advisory readiness ends and covert testing, or a fraud guarantee, would begin is the whole point.
A short scoping agreement up front, a focused mapping-and-review window across the flows that matter, and a documented report your leadership can act on. Built for a board that wants an answer this quarter, not a multi-quarter program.
We keep it tight and senior-led, scoped to the flows and business units in question and agreed in writing before review begins:
Want a fast read before you scope? Start with the free Deepfake Exposure Self-Check. It runs entirely in your browser.
The engagement ends in artifacts your board risk committee, your fraud and treasury leaders, and your CISO can use: a clear read on where a deepfake attempt would land, the control gaps that matter most, and the short list of moves that most reduce your exposure. Not a certificate. A defensible starting point you own.
A concrete, documented read on your deepfake exposure the day the engagement closes:
A single-program readiness assessment is the core engagement. Three scoped options extend it when the shape of the work calls for it:
Every option produces readiness artifacts you own and act on with your fraud, treasury, security, and counsel teams. None of it is a covert test of your staff, ongoing monitoring run by DSE, or a guarantee against fraud.
Sponsored by security, fraud, and treasury leadership, and scoped so it gives the CISO, the head of fraud, the treasurer, and the CRO a defensible read they can put in front of a board risk committee, distinct from a technical red team and a natural partner to it.
You answer for whether a convincing impersonation could move money out of the firm. An exposure map and a control-gap report turn "we think we would catch it" into a defensible position you can put in front of the board and a cyber insurer.
You own the wire and cash-movement controls a deepfake attempt is built to exploit. The assessment shows where a single approver, a speed-pressured request, or a missing callback leaves a gap, and the out-of-band controls that close it.
After a sector incident, the board wants to know the firm is not the next headline. A scoped assessment and a board-ready report give you comparable evidence and a prioritized plan for the money-movement flows your program answers for.
Cyber insurers increasingly push for incident-response and fraud-verification readiness, and a documented assessment is the evidence a renewal or a questionnaire asks for. And this pairs naturally with the AI Incident Response Tabletop: the tabletop rehearses the response when an attempt gets through, while this assessment reduces the chance it does, so the two give leadership a before-and-after view of the same risk.
Before you scope an assessment, get a read on where you stand. Answer a few questions about which high-risk workflows exist at your firm, whether out-of-band verification and callback protocols are required, and whether staff have had any deepfake-fraud awareness training, and our free, 100% browser-local Deepfake Exposure Self-Check returns an exposure score and the top process gaps it found. Nothing you enter leaves your browser. Bring the output to a scoping call and we turn it into a full readiness assessment.
What does it cost? The fee is fixed in writing after a short scoping call. It scales with the number of transaction flows and business units in scope, and with whether you add simulated scenarios or a multi-unit program, not your headcount. See the non-binding market-estimate ranges for this and every DSE engagement on the pricing page.
See engagement models →What security, fraud, treasury, and risk leaders ask before they scope a deepfake defense readiness assessment.
It is a fixed-scope, advisory review of how exposed your firm is to deepfake-enabled fraud and executive impersonation, and of the controls that would stop it. We map the high-value flows an attacker would target, wire and payment approval, treasury operations, help-desk identity verification, executive support, and vendor payment changes, and review the verification and approval controls that gate them. It ends in a board-ready report with prioritized control gaps. It is readiness and advisory work: not a covert test of your staff, not ongoing monitoring, and not a guarantee against fraud.
No, not without explicit consent and scoping. The core engagement is advisory: we assess exposure and controls with your teams and your process documentation. We can walk simulated, tabletop-style scenarios with your leadership, but we do not run unannounced impersonation, phishing, or vishing attempts against your people, and we do not attempt unauthorized access to any system. If you specifically want a consented, scoped simulation exercise, that is agreed in writing before anything runs.
Not directly. This engagement is a point-in-time readiness assessment. Where ongoing deepfake or voice-fraud detection tooling is warranted, DSE stays advisory and orchestrates a vetted MDR or detection partner on your behalf, defining the requirement, helping select the partner, and directing the program. The partner runs the monitoring; DSE does not run a detection service itself. That keeps our advice independent of any single tool.
We focus on the process controls that actually stop a synthetic-identity attempt: out-of-band verification (confirming a request through a separate, known channel), multi-person approval for money movement, callback protocols to pre-established contacts for payment and payee changes, and help-desk challenge-response procedures for identity verification. A convincing deepfake defeats "it looked and sounded right," so the defense is a process step that does not rely on recognizing a face or a voice. We rate where those steps are missing, inconsistent, or bypassable under pressure.
The fee is fixed in writing after a short scoping call and scales with the number of transaction flows and business units in scope and whether you add simulated scenarios or a multi-unit program, not your company size. We publish non-binding market-estimate ranges for every engagement, including this one, on the engagement models page.
Last reviewed: 2026-07-05 · Initial release. The AI Deepfake / Social-Engineering Defense Readiness Assessment is a service line of the AI Security & Cyber Risk practice. All work is assessment, readiness, and advisory: an exposure map across high-value transaction flows, a review of out-of-band verification and approval controls, optional consented simulated scenarios, and a board-ready report of prioritized control gaps. It is not covert social engineering of staff, not unauthorized system access, and not ongoing detection or monitoring, which DSE orchestrates through a vetted MDR or tooling partner rather than running itself. It is not a guarantee against fraud and not legal advice. We work alongside your fraud, treasury, security, and counsel teams.