AI and ML curbing financial fraud

In 2016, thieves stole $16 billion, up almost $1 billion from 2015, using either stolen credit or debit cards, or by creating fraudulent accounts. At first blush, it would appear that the good guys are rapidly losing ground, but those numbers do not tell the whole story as losses per victim, during that same time period, dropped an impressive 11%, falling from $1,165 to $1,038 for each targeted individual. The average out-of-pocket cost to the consumer in these cases decreased from $56 to $48. The increase in fraud is partially due to the rise in the number of scammers and is also because of yearly inflation. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) played a significant role in the decline of loss-per-victim, and seem ready to drive down losses even further.