Engineering firm Arup has lost HK$200 million after falling victim to a deepfake video, during which ??a digitally cloned version of its chief financial officer demanded monetary transfers.
The hyper-realistic video, which was generated using artificial intelligence, targeted an employee at the Hong Kong office of the international firm in January.
According to the British business newspaper Financial Times (FT), which broke the news this morning, it is "one of the world's biggest known deepfake scams".
"We can confirm that fake voices and images were used," Arup told the FT.
"Our financial stability and business operations were not affected and none of our internal systems were compromised," it added. Investigations are ongoing
Arup is an international engineering firm that has worked on landmark structures including the Sagrada Familia, the world's longest sea crossing and the Sydney Opera House.
The scam is reported to have started after a member of staff in the Hong Kong office received a message regarding a "confidential transaction" from what appeared to be Arup's UK-based CFO.
This led to a video conference in which the staff member was asked by the fake CFO to make 15 transfers to five Hong Kong bank accounts, totalling HK$200 million (£20 million).
The elaborate deepfake video also impersonated several other company employees.

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