Deepfake Risk: Are Your Employees Ready?

Deepfakes have exploded onto the cyber risk landscape, transforming from a novelty to an all too convincing tool for both cybercriminals and malicious actors. What was once riddled with tell-tale signs—unrealistic facial movements, glitchy voices—has evolved into a near-flawless deception that is easy to create and deploy at scale and speed. With AI advancements accelerating, deepfakes now look and sound so real that many employees, and even seasoned professionals, can and will fall victim to their convincing nature.

The question is no longer whether deepfakes will affect businesses—it’s how prepared your organization is to handle this escalating threat. While technical teams work on detection tools for Deepfake videos and validation processes to prove validity, addressing the human layer is just as critical.

How Deepfakes Have Gotten Better—And Why It Matters

Deepfake technology has advanced dramatically, thanks to breakthroughs in AI and machine learning. Today’s deepfakes:

• Perfect Facial Mimicry: AI can now replicate subtle expressions, eye movements, and lip sync with unnerving accuracy.
• Hyper-Realistic Voices: Voice cloning technologies mimic tone, cadence, and accent, making it nearly impossible to distinguish between real and fake audio.
• Rapid Scalability: Deepfakes can be generated quickly and cheaply, allowing attackers to target organizations at scale.

These factors create a “looks real to me” effect that makes traditional awareness training inadequate. Employees need more than general advice to “verify before you trust”—they need tools and strategies to navigate this new terrain confidently.

The Human Layers of Deepfake Resilience

At Cybermaniacs, we know the technical defenses against deepfakes—video validation, AI-powered detection, and multi-layered verification—are essential. But what about the human defenses? These are equally critical and require a deeper look into the behaviors, perceptions, and culture that shape how employees react to threats like deepfakes.

Human Resilience Pillars: Threat Awareness

In our Cyber Secure Human Competency Model, we focus on five pillars of human resilience. The first is threat awareness, which in this case is the appropriate place to start. Research shows we have a long way to go, and quickly on the first steps in a learning journey.

• Threat Awareness: A recent survey found that 57% of global consumers believed they could detect a deepfake video, while 43% felt they could not distinguish between real and manipulated content. (Statista)

Broad awareness and engagement campaigns should start and iterate throughout the year, this is not the time to let perfect be the enemy of the good. We also suggest incorportaint behavioral training to go beyond recognition to teach practical decision-making, especially under pressure. Can your team identify a suspicious video or voice clip and act appropriately, even in high-stakes scenarios? 

2. Psychological Factors: Perception and Influence

Our Psychology Model examines over 30 factors that shape human behavior. One that stands out in the context of deepfakes is perception of authority. Deepfakes often exploit hierarchical structures, posing as CEOs, managers, or trusted vendors to manipulate employees.

• Employees need tools and training to balance respect for authority with critical thinking. Are they equipped to question an unusual request, even when it seems to come from someone they trust?

3. Culture: Willingness and Information Flow

In our Culture Model, we evaluate how an organization’s risk culture influences its ability to prevent and respond to threats. Two critical elements for deepfake resilience are:

• Willingness: Are employees encouraged and empowered to question unusual communications, even when it disrupts the norm?
• Information Flow: Does your organization have a clear, accessible process for reporting suspicious activity? Can information flow easily both top-down (policies and rules) and bottom-up (feedback, questions, and reporting)?

A robust risk culture doesn’t just rely on policies—it creates an environment where employees feel safe and confident in their role as defenders of the organization.

Taking Action Against Deepfake Risks

Deepfake technology is advancing at a pace that demands immediate attention. But don’t assume your employees will instinctively know how to handle these threats—or that they can’t be empowered to support your business in meaningful ways. To combat this fast-moving risk vector, organizations need to focus on:

• Building human resilience through targeted training that fosters confidence and critical judgment.
• Exploring psychological factors like authority perception to better understand how employees interact with threats.
• Developing a strong risk culture where willingness and open information flow support proactive responses to emerging risks.

Questions to Consider

1. How confident are your employees in identifying and reporting deepfakes?
2. Does your training address decision-making under pressure, not just recognition?
3. Is your risk culture encouraging open communication and critical thinking?
4. Are your policies and processes agile enough to respond to new deepfake threats?

The Path Forward

Deepfake risk is here to stay, and it’s evolving fast. Addressing this challenge requires more than technical defenses—it requires a human-first approach that builds resilience, strengthens culture, and empowers employees to act. At Cybermaniacs, we specialize in unpicking these complexities and building strategies that work.

Ready to take the next step? Let’s talk about how we can help you prepare for the risks of tomorrow.