"Once a fringe curiosity, the deepfake economy has grown to become a $7.5 billion market, with some predictions projecting that it will hit $38.5 billion by 2032. Deepfakes are now everywhere, and the stock market is not the only part of the economy that is vulnerable to their impact. Those responsible for the creation of deepfakes are also targeting individual businesses, sometimes with the goal of extracting money and sometimes simply to cause damage."
"In a Deloitte poll published in 2024, one in four executives reported that their companies had been hit by deepfake incidents that targeted financial and accounting data. Lawmakers are beginning to take notice of this growing threat. On October 13, 2025, California's Governor Gavin Newsom signed the California AI Transparency Act into law. When it was first introduced in 2024, the Act required large "frontier providers"-companies like OpenAI, Anthropic, Microsoft, Google, and X-to implement tools that made it easier for users to identify AI-generated content."
On May 19, 2023, an AI-generated image of smoke billowing from the Pentagon circulated on Twitter, triggering a rapid S&P 500 drop that erased billions in market value before markets recovered. The incident marked the first recorded case of a deepfake directly affecting the stock market. The deepfake economy has expanded to roughly $7.5 billion, with projections up to $38.5 billion by 2032. Deepfakes increasingly target companies to extort money or inflict damage; a 2024 Deloitte poll found one in four executives reporting incidents affecting financial and accounting data. The California AI Transparency Act, signed in 2025, extends transparency requirements to large online platforms and device manufacturers to help users identify AI-generated content.
Read at Fast Company
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