Cyberfraud is growing more complicated, there’s no doubt about that. While the cost of cybercrime worldwide in 2018 was around $0.86 trillion, that number is expected to rise to $15.63 trillion by 2029 – demonstrating the jump in sophisticated technology and the scale at which malicious actors are able to exploit it.
If you’re running a company right now – or you have any kind of presence online that involves handling data, finances, or customer information – this is one of the key concerns you should be thinking about. So what is cyberfraud exactly, how has it developed, and what tools are at your disposal to combat it?
What is Cyberfraud?
Put simply, cyberfraud is the term for all illegal online activities that are designed to deceive people or organisations. Often, it leads to data losses, financial losses, and reputational losses – all of which can be detrimental to SMEs or individuals looking to grow sustainably.
It’s also a type of fraud that uses automated bots and the anonymity of the internet to scale its attacks, sometimes targeting multiple victims at once to maximise financial gain while minimising the risk of being detected.
As mentioned previously, over the last few years, the technology being used by these fraudsters is getting better, leading to more convincing scams and a higher success rate in bypassing traditional security measures. AI-driven agents, in particular, have become instrumental in social engineering, making it harder than ever for victims – or linear security features, for that matter – to distinguish between legitimate and malicious activity.
Fighting Cyberfraud in 2025
As the tech behind cyberfraud has developed, however, so too has the tech being used to combat it. A good example of this can be found in the work of Datadome, a cybersecurity company specialising in both bot management and cyberfraud prevention. The ethos here is to fight AI-powered fraud with AI-powered protection, with the Datadome cyberfraud platform using multi-layered AI to detect and block AI-generated fraud in an instant.
One of the key selling points is the platform’s ability to protect every digital door in real time, whether that’s websites, mobile apps, APIs, or ads. Its interconnected AI models also deliver continuous, autonomous protection, with collective intelligence that blocks new threats while simultaneously cutting costs and protecting revenue at every turn.
Case in point, DataDome’s AI detection engine learns from 5 trillion signals a day – adapting in real time to threats seen across their global customer base and transforming those learnings into proactive defences.
Fighting AI With AI
This is the kind of work that needs to be done to fight the problem right now. At one point in time, traditional cyber defences like CAPTCHA, CDNs, and web application firewalls could be enough to keep most malicious traffic at bay, but those measures alone are just not sufficient enough anymore. For the last few years, AI has been reshaping our world, and in the world of cybersecurity, AI-powered bots can now solve CAPTCHA in seconds, mimicking legitimate user patterns to slip through firewalls unnoticed.
The result is that traditional defences, while still useful, need to be reinforced with smarter, adaptive systems that can evolve as quickly as the cybersecurity threats themselves. In this case, AI-powered defence mechanisms.
Imagine a malicious bot attempting to scrape product prices from an e-commerce site. On its own, the bot might rotate IP addresses and simulate mouse movements to appear human, but an AI-powered defence can fight that by analysing millions of behavioural signals in real time – mouse dynamics, typing patterns, request frequency, device fingerprints, and more.
Essentially, the AI detects subtle anomalies that a human or traditional system might miss, instantly flagging and blocking the bot before it can extract valuable data.
Meanwhile, the system continues learning from that encounter, improving its detection algorithms for all future threats. As mentioned before, DataDome’s AI detection engine, specifically, learns from 5 trillion signals a day. That’s a lot of data being processed, and more than enough to create a dynamic, self-improving shield against all types of cyberfraud.
Conclusion
Whether it’s phishing, identity theft, account takeover, ad fraud, or payment fraud, the problems that businesses and individuals face today are the same: cybercriminals are increasingly sophisticated and relentless, and that won’t stop until every vulnerability is addressed with the most intelligent, adaptive defences.
Failing to do so, of course, comes at a cost. In 2025, 60% of SMEs subjected to a cyberattack go out of business within 6 months, proving how devastating a single breach can be. The financial losses, reputational damage, and operational disruptions are often irreversible, even for companies that have contingency plans in place, and this is what makes AI-driven defences not just a luxury, but a necessity to survive in an increasingly digital world. The world of cyberfraud is getting fiercer, that’s for sure. But so too is the world of cybersecurity.
