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This 1 question saved Ferrari from a big deepfake scam: ‘I need to identify you'
The deepfaker began talking about how he was calling from a different mobile phone number because he needed to discuss something confidential.
A Ferrari NV executive started receiving unexpected messages, seemingly from the company's CEO Benedetto Vigna. One of the messages read, “Hey, did you hear about the big acquisition we’re planning? I could need your help." The messages were not from Benedetto Vigna's business mobile number, the profile picture was different even though it was an image of the CEO. Another message read, “Be ready to sign the Non-Disclosure Agreement our lawyer is set to send you asap." A third read, "Italy’s market regulator and Milan stock-exchange have been already informed. Stay ready and please utmost discretion.”
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But the executive realised that something was not right when he recieved a phone call from the same number. The voice on the other side of the call was an impersonation of Benedetto Vigna using deepfake tools. The deepfaker began talking about how he was calling from a different mobile phone number because he needed to discuss something confidential.
The executive started to have suspicions and began to pick up on the slightest of mechanical intonations. He said to the deepfaker, “Sorry, Benedetto, but I need to identify you."
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Then he posed a question: What was the title of the book Benedetto Vigna had just recommended to him a few days earlier. This was a query that only the CEO could answer. After this the call abruptly ended and Ferrari opened an internal investigation.
This is not the first such attempt to impersonate a high-profile executive as in May, it was reported that Mark Read, CEO of advertising giant WPP Plc, was also the target of an unsuccessful deepfake scam that imitated him on a Teams call.
Stefano Zanero, a professor of cybersecurity at Italy’s Politecnico di Milano, said as per Bloomberg, “It’s just a matter of time and these AI-based deepfake sophistication tools are expected to become incredibly accurate."
