INTERPOL Links AI to 55% of Reported Cybercrime in Africa

The use of artificial intelligence facilitates 55% of cybercrime incidents reported in Africa as it helps accelerate attacks and expand their scope and makes it hard to detect them, an Aug. 3 INTERPOL report states.

According to INTERPOL’s 40-page African Cyberthreat Assessment Report 2026, the data for the report comes from a survey of 36 member countries from Africa. It sees online crime as an operation that transcends borders rather than a collection of individual offenses.

There is diversity in cyber laws and low AI readiness among law enforcement agencies across Africa, according to the assessment. Africa had more than 1.1 billion mobile subscribers in 2025, the report claims.

Losses Double

The report estimates the cost of cybercrime losses at $484 million, while in 2024, the figure was $192 million. The main reason for the rise is seen by the report in AI-enabled scams, credential harvesting, and automated social engineering attacks.

Online scams were the leading form of cybercrimes reported in 2025, the report says. Mobile money platforms, social media, and artificial intelligence enabled attackers to get access to their victims.

The report states that 72% of countries from those surveyed experienced scam operations, with the highest concentration observed in Southern and West Africa.

In East Africa, high numbers of mobile money fraud and ransomware attacks on the infrastructure were reported. Business email compromise and romance scams occurred mostly in Central and West Africa, while high connectivity in Southern Africa made it an attractive target for international hackers, the report claims.

AI Facilitates Fraud

The report says TrendAI, one of INTERPOL’s partners, detected 600,000 sextortion cases. Online sexual extortion and harassment occurred widely and were often supported by AI-enabled deepfakes and synthetic media.

As the report says, business email compromise grew more sophisticated. Africa-based hackers used artificial intelligence to develop convincing emails and target victims from Europe and North America using the infrastructure located in several different jurisdictions.

According to the report, the lack of real-time data sharing between banks, telecommunications companies and law enforcement provides a way for financial fraud.

To exploit it, criminals combine legitimate information with fictitious data to produce synthetic identities that bypass advanced biometric authentication and are used to open bank accounts, apply for mobile loans, and register SIM cards under fake names.

States Take Action

“AI is automating every aspect of a cyberattack, from reconnaissance and phishing, to extortion and evasion,” Neal Jetton, the director of INTERPOL’s Cybercrime unit explained.

“AI is automating every aspect of a cyberattack, from reconnaissance and phishing, to extortion and evasion,” — Neal Jetton, the director of INTERPOL’s Cybercrime unit

In 2025, 17 states adopted new or revised cyber laws, INTERPOL reports. Moreover, Senegal introduced an online reporting system that will help better respond to online incidents involving children.

Four INTERPOL-led campaigns — Serengeti 2.0, Contender 3.0, Sentinel, and Red Card 2.0 — resulted in more than 1,500 arrests, seizure of hundreds of devices, and $100 million worth of assets, INTERPOL says.

The assessment also highlights the need for standardized digital forensics, improved international cooperation, AI literacy among law enforcement officers and public-private partnerships.

INTERPOL conducted the analysis in the framework of its African Joint Operation against Cybercrime. The UK Foreign, Commonwealth, and Development Office funded the initiative. Fortinet, Mastercard, the Shadowserver Foundation, S2W, and TrendAI provided the data.