The rise of generative AI and large language models (LLMs) is enabling more sophisticated financial scams by helping criminals create convincing fake identities, websites, ads and media coverage at scale. Writing for the Financial Times, ISD Analyst and Editorial Manager Siddharth Venkataramakrishnan looks at how scammers flood the web with fabricated content, building entire online ecosystems that appear credible to investors. Exploiting both these technologies and weaknesses in social media and publishing platforms, these networks earn trust first, then manipulate victims. “Instead of cashing out directly from customers […] these groups make money by winning trust. Any number of parallel Google searches or AI queries, “just to check”, will result in a stream of legitimate-seeming impressions”.

Read the full investigation here.