{"id":999883661,"date":"2025-06-23T05:39:00","date_gmt":"2025-06-23T11:39:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.dice.com\/hiring\/?p=999883661"},"modified":"2025-10-01T09:11:09","modified_gmt":"2025-10-01T15:11:09","slug":"best-practices-for-defeating-deepfake-candidate-fraud","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dice.com\/hiring\/recruitment\/best-practices-for-defeating-deepfake-candidate-fraud","title":{"rendered":"Best Practices for Defeating Deepfake Candidate Fraud"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Laura Durfee<\/a>, Senior Director of Talent, DNSFilter<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

As technology continues its headlong evolutionary sprint, talent acquisition pros must address the skyrocketing threat of deepfake and fraudulent candidates. This is no longer a theoretical concern; we are seeing these types of fraud happen on a regular basis. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last year, the U.S. Department of Justice<\/a> discovered an operation, potentially linked to North Korea, that impacted more than 300 companies and generated almost $7 million for non-existent IT workers. A prominent cybersecurity firm unwittingly hired an IT worker<\/a> from North Korea who was using a stolen American identity and who tried to install malware on the company\u2019s network. Another company<\/a> unintentionally hired someone from North Korea, and this person breached its network, exfiltrated data and demanded a ransom. And a hiring platform became suspicious of a candidate when he showed signs of having rehearsed his background story and provided evasive answers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The threat to organizations is clear. Whereas it was once a given that candidates were actual human beings, companies must now enact a stringent verification process to ensure the candidate is legitimate. Fraudulent activity by deepfake candidates has increased substantially; companies need to know about this increase, the role hiring departments must play and practical strategies to diminish or eliminate these risks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Candidate Fraud on the Rise<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Gartner analysts predict that one in four job applicants may be fake by 2028. For talent acquisition pros, this is a terrifying possibility, especially for remote positions where it\u2019s difficult or impossible to meet in person prior to the hiring decision.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hiring fake applicants comes with multiple negative consequences, not the least of which are wasted time, money and human effort. Other negatives include intellectual property theft, data breaches, the installation of malware and brand damage. It\u2019s a talent pro\u2019s nightmare to find out that a candidate they went to bat for is not a real person, or at least not the person they pretended to be. Even worse is discovering that the candidate who seemed like a great fit actually came in with malicious intent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Factors That Enable Fraud<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Candidate fraud is increasing in volume and sophistication, enabled by a confluence of factors:<\/p>\n\n\n\n