With the rise of generative AI tools, fraudsters can now scam victims out of millions in mere seconds, prompting renewed urgency among cybersecurity experts to fight back with emerging technologies like quantum AI.
At the SAS Innovate conference this week, renowned former con artist Frank Abagnale, the inspiration behind the film “Catch Me If You Can,” warned that AI and social engineering have made it exponentially easier to commit fraud from afar.
“50 years ago, I accomplished fraud domestically by gaining the confidence of an individual,” said Abagnale. “These days, it is often being done thousands of miles away by people who never see the victim. It is about 4,000 times easier to commit fraud today due to all the AI and social engineering tools and channels available.”
Watch this TechRepublic interview with Frank Abagnale from 2019 in which he offers hackers advice
Fighting fraud with GenAI and quantum computing
While AI is being used extensively by cybercriminal gangs, it is also available to those in cybersecurity and analytics to defend organizations and predict areas of weakness. Nowhere is this more evident and more needed than in the financial services sector. Online fraudsters are focusing much of their attention on where the money resides.
“The level of sophistication shown by criminals needs to be matched or bettered on our side,” said Tatiana Zambrano, program manager at Truist Financial. “We need to utilize technology to outsmart them and to be able to move faster than them.”
SEE: Breakthrough Could Lead to Quantum Encryption in 10 Years
GenAI and quantum computing are two key areas that are exerting a big impact on fighting fraud. SAS is researching and developing tools that bring AI, data science, and quantum computing together.
Quantum computing harnesses some of the principles of quantum mechanics to solve problems beyond the ability of traditional supercomputers – or at least that they can’t solve fast enough. The hope is that this technology will result in advanced calculations that are an order of magnitude or more faster than current computing devices. The many advances of GenAI over the past couple of years could be taken to new heights when paired with quantum computing.
In the area of fraud detection, for example, anomalies, fraud, money laundering, and other scams could be picked up in near real time rather than in minutes, hours, or even days, as can sometimes be the case.
What is quantum AI?
“Quantum AI is quantum computing paired with AI to reduce the time needed for analysis of complex data sets from months to minutes,” said SAS CTO Bryan Harris.
A recent SAS study on quantum AI showed that it is already on the radar of many executives.
- More than 60% are actively investing in or exploring opportunities in quantum AI, though they have concerns.
- 38% cited cost as a barrier to adoption.
- 35% confessed to a lack of understanding of the subject.
- 31% were unsure of its real-world value.
- 31% noted a lack of trained personnel.
- 29% wondered about the lack of clear regulatory guidelines.
The use cases driving adoption are:
- Data analytics and machine learning (48%).
- Research and development (41%).
- Cybersecurity (38%).
- Supply chain and logistics (31%).
- Finance and risk management (26%).
- Marketing (20%).
“Organizations need a clear roadmap and guide to better leverage quantum computing and quantum AI,” said Harris.
DOWNLOAD these Quantum Computing Use Cases from TechRepublic Premium
Quantum AI across many industries
As well as fraud detection, Harris outlined other verticals that could materially benefit from quantum AI; this includes better patient outcomes in healthcare, eliminating unexpected supply chain shortages in trade, and improving manufacturing workflows.
For example, Proctor & Gamble (PG) took a quantum approach to solving an issue with its industrial workflows. This involved how best to reuse mixing tanks. There could be more than 100 products ready to be mixed in five massive tanks, adding up to 10114 combinations.
“We use SAS to create an immersive digital twin to address complex what-if questions using a quantum approach,” said Krista Comstock, director of digital innovation at PG. “Instead of six hours to solve our mixing problem using a really good BI engine, we managed to solve it in two minutes with quantum.”
