Brazil at Risk of Significant Losses from Identity Theft Scams

Brazil is facing a growing problem of identity theft, which can cause significant losses if not blocked. According to a report by Serasa Experian, attempts at digital identity fraud could have caused up to R$ 1.98 billion in losses in the first quarter of 2026 if they hadn't been prevented. These attempts are made by criminals who use third-party data, fake documents or manipulated information to pose as another person in online registries and transactions. The Serasa Experian survey identified almost 1.5 million attempts at registry and identity validation, which represents an approach every five seconds. This is 36.6% more than in the same period of 2025. Payment methods had the highest volume of identity theft attempts, with 644,500 occurrences in the quarter, followed by telecommunications and banks and cards. The Southeast region concentrated the largest share of identity theft attempts in Brazil, followed by the Northeast and South. In São Paulo, the state recorded over 230,000 occurrences, representing 15.8% of the total accumulated in the country. Additionally, the Serasa Experian survey shows that artificial intelligence is being used to make the scams more convincing. The technology can be used to create more sophisticated and harder-to-detect attacks, making vigilance and protection against these types of scams even more important. The use of artificial intelligence for attacks is one of the main trends in this universe in the coming months, and it is essential that people are aware of this and take measures to protect themselves.