A guy named Jim Browning hunts scammers for a living. He posts it all on YouTube.
Recently he was on a video call with someone and something felt off. So he tried something simple. He asked the person to hold three fingers in front of their face.
The face glitched. The hand passed through it like it wasn’t there.
Because it wasn’t. AI deepfake. Live video call. Real time.
The scammer stalled. Deflected. Then dropped the call. The clip went viral.
Most people still think deepfakes are something that happens in movies or in political ads. They don’t think it’s happening on their Zoom calls.
It is. And it’s happening in real estate transactions.
The trick that’s already expiring
The three finger test works because current deepfake models can’t cleanly render a hand crossing over a generated face. The AI glitches. The fake is exposed.
Every viral detection hack teaches the model builders exactly what to fix. The models will catch up. And fast.
I met with Gregg Sofer recently. EVP Chief Compliance Officer and Deputy Chief Legal Officer at Fidelity National Financial. Before FNF, 30 years as a state and federal prosecutor. United States Attorney for the Western District of Texas. Counselor to the Attorney General for Criminal and National Security Matters.
Gregg made this point directly. The three finger test has a shelf life. Relying on one detection trick creates false confidence. It can actually make people less secure because they think they’ve verified someone when they haven’t.
The better approach is building verification into your workflow at every step. Callbacks on known numbers. Two person approvals on wire instructions. Second channel confirmation. Biometric identity tools like CLEAR that AI can’t fake.
Tricks expire. Systems don’t.
The numbers behind the crisis
Between 2022 and 2023, deepfake use in cybercrime increased 3,000%. In 2024, a deepfake attempt happened once every 5 minutes.
In my first newsletter issue, I wrote about voice cloning. Three seconds of audio is all it takes to copy someone’s voice. But video is the next frontier. And it’s already here.
AI can now generate convincing video in real time. Face swapping. Voice imitation. Live manipulation. An AI system can carry on a phone conversation sounding exactly like someone you trust, adapting to what you say as you say it.
The fraud numbers Gregg shared back this up.
FBI’s IC3 in 2024: 21,442 business email compromise complaints. Adjusted losses over $2.7 billion. Cyber enabled fraud accounts for almost 83% of all reported losses.
Real estate wire fraud losses in under 10 years: $9 million to $446 million. 50 fold.
Q1 of 2025: 47% of residential, commercial, and business purpose loan transactions had issues with wire and title fraud. Almost half.
Title companies. Law firms. Realtors. Sellers. Buyers. All targets.
These attacks come from the dark web, sophisticated international organizations, and are powered by AI. Spoofing emails now look like they’re coming from real senders.
Since ChatGPT launched in 2022, phishing messages surged 4,151%.
The Business Invoice Swapper
Gregg walked me through one called the Business Invoice Swapper.
It scans compromised email accounts. Finds invoices and payment instructions. Swaps the banking details to redirect funds. Across languages. At scale. Automated.
These tools aren’t theoretical. They’re in use right now. In real transactions.
Seller impersonation is the other crisis
Wire fraud gets the headlines. But seller and borrower impersonation is accelerating just as fast.
In 2024, nearly 2 in 10 companies were seeing impersonation attempts every month. Not annually. Monthly.
Rocket Mortgage reported 73% of real estate professionals saw an increase in this type of fraud in 2024. 58% experienced it personally or through their company within the last six months.
What does it look like? Someone shows up pretending to be the owner of a property and initiates a sale. Forged documents. Stolen identities. They collect the proceeds and disappear. The title search and examination process is one of the primary defenses against this, which is why the work title professionals do matters more now than ever.
What FNF and Chicago Title are doing about it
FNF has built its fraud prevention strategy on three phases: education, execution, and enhancement.
Education is WireSafe, FNF’s awareness program for consumers, customers, and employees. It teaches the people involved in a transaction how to recognize wire fraud and fraudulent email. If the people closest to the transaction don’t know what to look for, the best tech in the world won’t save them.
Execution is inHere, FNF’s experience platform. It’s a protected portal that brings buyers, sellers, and agents into one secure environment and reduces reliance on email for the entire transaction. Less email means less surface area for spoofing and interception. It’s the operational layer that puts the education into practice.
Enhancement is the newest phase. FNF partnered with CLEAR Secure to integrate CLEAR1, CLEAR’s biometric identity verification platform, directly into inHere. CLEAR is the same identity platform trusted by over 33 million members at airports, stadiums, and more than 100 partner locations across North America. Now it’s being applied to real estate closings to validate that buyers and sellers are actually who they say they are.
Seller impersonation is the target. By layering biometric verification into the transaction, FNF is making it significantly harder for criminals to pose as property owners or slip through with forged identities. The first phase rolled out in July 2025 in select markets, with a broader rollout informed by those early results.
Gregg is doing a seminar
On April 21, Gregg is presenting for Chicago Title. “18 Years Inside the DOJ: Lessons Learned and What Comes Next.” He’ll be pulling from major investigations and cases, breaking down how enforcement actually works from the inside, and what it means for the regulatory landscape going forward. Fraud will be a major focus.
Tuesday, April 21, 2026. 9:00 AM to 10:00 AM CDT. Virtual. CLE credit available.
What you should do right now
If you’re an attorney, realtor, or anyone involved in real estate transactions, here’s what matters most in 2026.
Stop trusting inbound calls about wire instructions. It doesn’t matter how familiar the voice sounds. Always call back on a number you already have on file.
Set up a safe word. Agree on a verbal passphrase with trusted parties at the start of every transaction. AI can clone a voice. It can’t guess a code word you set up in person.
Get wire instructions out of email. Ask your title company if they use a secure wire platform. At Chicago Title we use inHere, which takes wire details completely out of email.
Verify seller identity. With impersonation fraud surging, take extra steps to confirm the person selling is actually the owner. Biometric tools like CLEAR are becoming available for exactly this.
Report immediately. If something goes wrong, contact your bank and file with the FBI’s IC3 at ic3.gov. The Recovery Asset Team froze or recovered 66% of stolen funds in 2024 when victims reported right away. Minutes matter.
Have the conversation before closing day. Two minutes of fraud prevention talk with your client could save them everything. Tell them about voice cloning. Tell them never to trust an inbound call about wire changes.
The bigger picture
New ALTA research. Nearly 450 professionals surveyed across 47 states.
The title insurance industry mitigates between $600 billion and $900 billion in risk exposure every year.
Over 52% of title professionals spend at least 11 hours a month on fraud prevention. Nearly 15% spend more than 50 hours. Fraud and forgery are the biggest claim drivers.
A standard transaction takes about 22 hours of work. Complex files take 45. Title professionals are searching records, reviewing documents, clearing defects, and now spending more and more time verifying identities and watching for fraud.
73% of title companies employ 10 or fewer people. Small teams doing enormous work to protect the biggest purchase most people will ever make.
The fraud is getting faster, cheaper, and harder to detect. The people fighting it deserve to be recognized. And the people involved in transactions need to take it seriously.
I’d love to hear what you’re doing on your transactions to protect against these schemes. Please reach out if you’d like to have a conversation.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much money is lost to real estate wire fraud each year? Annual losses went from $9 million to $446 million in less than 10 years. The FBI’s IC3 received 21,442 business email compromise complaints in 2024 with adjusted losses over $2.7 billion. Cyber enabled fraud accounts for nearly 83% of all reported losses.
How common is wire and title fraud in real estate transactions? In Q1 of 2025, 47% of residential, commercial, and business purpose loan transactions had issues with wire and title fraud. Title companies, law firms, realtors, sellers, and buyers are all frequent targets.
What is the three finger test for deepfakes? On a video call, ask the other person to hold three fingers in front of their face. Current deepfake overlays glitch when a hand crosses over a generated face. It works today but security experts and fraud investigators like Gregg Sofer warn it has a limited shelf life as AI models improve rapidly.
How is AI being used in real estate fraud? Phishing messages have surged 4,151% since ChatGPT launched. Deepfake use in cybercrime increased 3,000% between 2022 and 2023. Autonomous deepfake tools for phone scams are commercially available. AI tools like the Business Invoice Swapper scan compromised email accounts, alter banking details in invoices, and redirect funds at scale.
What is seller impersonation fraud? Criminals pose as property owners to sell or refinance properties they don’t own using forged documents and stolen identities. In 2024, nearly 2 in 10 companies experienced at least one attempt per month. 73% of real estate professionals saw an increase in this fraud type in 2024.
What is FNF doing to combat real estate fraud? Fidelity National Financial has built a three-phase fraud prevention strategy: education through the WireSafe awareness program, execution through the inHere experience platform that reduces reliance on email for the entire transaction, and enhancement through a partnership with CLEAR Secure that integrates CLEAR1 biometric identity verification directly into inHere. The first phase of the CLEAR rollout launched in July 2025 in select markets.
Sources
- FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) 2024 Annual Report
- CertifID State of Wire Fraud Report
- ALTA Title Insurance Industry Research
- FNF Announces Partnership with CLEAR to Fight Real Estate Fraud (Sept. 9, 2025)
- Rocket Mortgage on Seller Impersonation Fraud
- Huntress on the Three Finger Deepfake Test
