UK payment fraud losses reached £1.28 billion ($1.74 billion) in 2025 as criminals increasingly turned to artificial intelligence to create more convincing scams, prompting fresh warnings from UK Finance, the trade association representing more than 300 banks, payment providers and financial services firms.
The industry's Fraud Report 2026 showed authorised push payment (APP) fraud losses rose 19 per cent to £576.4 million ($785 million) last year, while overall payment fraud increased 4 per cent from 2024. UK Finance said organised criminal groups are increasingly using AI-powered tools, including deepfakes, cloned voices and synthetic identities, to impersonate trusted people and bypass identity checks.
