Threat actors are increasingly using AI-enabled social engineering to get around technical security measures, according to a new report from Visa. Social engineering attacks were behind the largest number of losses in the second half of last year.
“From July to December 2025, Visa identified nearly $1 billion in scam-related activity, making scams the single largest category of consumer payment fraud,” Visa says. “Unlike traditional fraud, these attacks typically do not require breaching technology. Instead, scammers impersonate trusted brands and institutions, manufacture urgency, and deceive victims into completing legitimate-looking transactions.”
The report also found that ransomware attacks rose by 26% in the second half of 2025, though the number of victims who paid the ransom fell to the lowest on record. Visa believes this reflects “improving resilience and recovery capabilities, as well as a reluctance to pay when data could still be leaked, regardless of payment.”
Michael Jabbara, SVP, Payment Ecosystem Risk and Control at Visa, stated, “The rapid adoption of AI has fundamentally lowered the barrier to entry for fraud. What once required deep technical skill can now be executed with a prompt. That reality makes intelligence-driven defenses and coordinated action across the ecosystem more critical than ever.”
Paul Fabara, Visa’s Chief Risk and Client Services Officer, added, “Payments at a network level continue to get safer, but threats are evolving faster than ever. Criminals are increasingly targeting people rather than technology, using deception, urgency, and AI-enabled tools to exploit trust. Addressing this shift requires continuous innovation at the network level and close collaboration across banks, merchants, policymakers, and the broader payments ecosystem.”
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Visa has the story: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260520153924/en/Visa-Threats-Report-As-Network-Security-Strengthens-Criminals-Accelerate-Shift-to-AI-Enabled-Social-Engineering
