Report

Veriff Deepfakes Report USA 2026

Artificial intelligence is rapidly advancing, and with it, the spread of deepfake visuals is creating new challenges for digital trust and identity verification.

To understand how people are responding, Veriff partnered with Kantar in February 2026 to run a large-scale survey. The research focuses on the United States, comparing it with the United Kingdom and Brazil.

Key insights covered:

The gap between deepfake awareness and actual detection ability among US consumers.
The mismatch between user confidence and real-world accuracy in identifying manipulated media.
The increasing reliance on platform trust and visual judgement despite declining reliability of human detection.

Why this report matters

In the US, identity verification is no longer just compliance, it is a core security layer. As deepfake technology becomes more realistic, relying on manual checks increases exposure to fraud, onboarding risk, and impersonation attacks.

0 %

growth in AI-generated or altered media presented during verifications in the last year

detection score for US respondents—only slightly better than a coin flip (where 1 is perfect accuracy)

0 %

awareness of the term “deepfake” in the US

0 %

of Americans cite fraud and impersonation scams as their top concern around synthetic media

What you’ll learn in this report

Deepfake detection accuracy in the US

Why people consistently fail to identify AI-generated video and images, even when confidence is high.

Identity fraud and synthetic media risks

How deepfakes are being used in impersonation and fraud attempts across digital onboarding and verification flows.

Human vs AI detection limits

Why experience with AI tools only improves detection ability by around 5%.

Future of identity verification

Why US businesses are shifting toward biometric authentication and AI-powered verification to detect what humans cannot.

Get the Veriff Deepfakes Report 2026

Reinforce your fraud prevention strategy with data-driven insights into how 1,000 US respondents interact with synthetic media. Learn why seeing is no longer believing in the US market.

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CCPA/CPRA
Compliant

GDPR EU
Compliant

SOC2 - TYPE II
Certified

ISO/IEC 27001:2022
Certified

UK Cyber Essentials
Certified

ISO/IEC 30107-3
Level 1

ISO/IEC 30107-3
Level 2

UKDIATF

Fido certified

Is the Deepfakes Report 2026 free to access?

Yes, the full report is available for free download to help organizations improve their fraud prevention strategies.

What is the current state of deepfake detection accuracy?

Research shows that human detection accuracy is currently at “chance level,” meaning the average person is essentially guessing when identifying deepfakes.

How does deepfake awareness in the US compare to other markets?

The US currently shows lower awareness (63%) and familiarity with deepfakes compared to the UK (74%) and Brazil (67%).

What defines a "high-risk" user in the context of AI fraud?

High-risk users are those who demonstrate low detection accuracy while maintaining high confidence in their ability to spot manipulated media.

Why is manual identity review becoming ineffective against deepfakes?

Modern AI can replicate visual cues like skin texture and facial movements so accurately that human intuition and visual inspection are no longer reliable safeguards.