INTERPOL Says AI Has Become a Core Driver of Cybercrime in Africa
INTERPOL said 55% of cybercrime cases recorded in Africa in 2025 involved artificial intelligence, marking a shift from AI as a support tool to a core operational weapon. Cybercrime losses in Africa more than doubled to $484 million in 2025, while direct economic damage reached at least $5 billion, according. . .
INTERPOL said 55% of cybercrime cases recorded in Africa in 2025 involved artificial intelligence, marking a shift from AI as a support tool to a core operational weapon. Cybercrime losses in Africa more than doubled to $484 million in 2025, while direct economic damage reached at least $5 billion, according to the report. INTERPOL urged African governments to prioritize investigator training and cross-border cooperation as most police agencies remain ill-equipped to counter AI-enabled cybercrime. Artificial intelligence has become a central tool for cybercriminals operating across Africa, allowing fraudsters with limited technical expertise to launch increasingly sophisticated attacks, according to INTERPOL's African Cyberthreat Assessment Report 2026, published in June. The report, which surveyed law enforcement agencies in 36 African countries, said AI became the primary driver of cybercrime operations in 2025, underscoring the growing challenge facing police forces that remain under-equipped and under-trained to combat rapidly evolving digital threats. More Than One in Two Cases Involved AIINTERPOL said 55% of cybercrime cases reported in 2025 involved artificial intelligence in some form. The report found that 47% of cases involved occasional AI use, while 8% involved frequent AI use. The organization described the trend as a transition from AI serving as a supporting tool to becoming the operational backbone of cybercrime in Africa. Moreover, generative AI tools, once limited to researchers and developers, have become widely accessible and standardized. Criminals with minimal technical expertise now use these tools to automate the full attack cycle, including target reconnaissance, personalized phishing campaigns, extortion, and evasion of security detection systems. Deepfakes, Synthetic Media and Autonomous RansomwareINTERPOL identified the rapid spread of deepfakes as the most visible sign of AI's growing role in cybercrime. The report said incidents involving AI-generated synthetic content increased sevenfold between the second and fourth quarters of 2024 across Africa. In Uganda, fraudsters used a manipulated video featuring a public figure to promote a fraudulent investment scheme, causing more than $2 million in losses before authorities intervened. Similarly, fake investment platforms such as CryptoBridge Exchange, Optcoin, and AfriQuantumX used AI-generated videos of executives and social media influencers to lure victims into fraudulent automated trading schemes. On the technical front, INTERPOL also reported the emergence of ransomware strains capable of writing and adapting their own malicious code. The report cited the PromptLock ransomware family as an example of malware that uses generative AI to customize malicious code and generate personalized ransom notes. Although such cases remain isolated or experimental, the report said they demonstrate that the technology already exists and that broader adoption is only a matter of time. AI Fuels Surge in SextortionArtificial intelligence also transformed sextortion, which recorded a sharp increase in 2025. AI image-generation tools now allow criminals to create highly realistic explicit images from a single photograph, making traditional verification methods increasingly ineffective. In Ghana, financial losses suffered by victims aged 18 to 24 increased fivefold. Authorities attributed much of that increase to AI-powered image manipulation that generated compromising images from photographs posted on social media. Meanwhile, criminals increasingly used AI to bypass Know Your Customer (KYC) verification procedures. INTERPOL said synthetic identities combining real and fabricated personal data became more common in 2025 to open bank accounts, obtain mobile loans, and register SIM cards under false identities, particularly in Cameroon, Mali, and Tanzania. Law Enforcement Struggles to Keep PaceLaw enforcement agencies have responded unevenly to the rapid rise of AI-enabled cybercrime. INTERPOL found that only 33% of surveyed agencies use AI for threat detection, while 31% use AI in digital forensics. Most agencies continue to rely primarily on manual processes. The report also found that only 8% of intelligence analysts possess advanced AI expertise, while 92% of agencies identified the shortage of technical skills as the main barrier to adopting AI-based investigative tools. Moreover, INTERPOL said the most critical gap is not technological but human. Most frontline investigators have not received training to identify AI-generated content, including cloned voice calls, manipulated videos, and highly personalized phishing emails. Cybercrime Losses More Than DoubleThe rapid adoption of AI comes amid a broader escalation in cybercrime across Africa. INTERPOL said cybercrime-related financial losses on the continent increased from $192 million in 2024 to $484 million in 2025, while the number of identified victims rose from 35,000 to 87,000. The organization estimated the direct economic cost of cybercrime in Africa at at least $5 billion in 2025. INTERPOL urged African governments to prioritize training investigators to detect AI-generated content rather than focusing solely on technological tools. It also called for stronger cross-border cooperation to counter criminal networks that already operate, in the report's words,"at machine speed. "