In Italy fraudsters used AI voice to siphon tens of millions of euros from bank
In Italy, a major international banking fraud is being investigated in which fraudsters used artificial intelligence to clone the voice of a familiar lawyer. Initially, about 95 million euros were transferred out of Fideuram bank, although a significant part of the funds was recovered. At least 36 million euros remain unaccounted for.
On 25 September, ANSA and Corriere della Sera reported on this.
The fraud itself took place in February 2026. Paolo Molesini, then president of Fideuram, received a WhatsApp message that appeared to be from Carlo Messina, head of the parent company Intesa Sanpaolo.
The message claimed that it was necessary to urgently carry out a series of international transfers through the Fideuram treasury for a financial operation that Intesa Sanpaolo was allegedly planning.
After that, Molesini received a call from a person posing as Paolo Nastasi, a corporate lawyer he knew from the international law firm A&O Shearman. According to the investigation, the real Nastasi had nothing to do with the matter, and the fraudsters reproduced his voice using artificial intelligence tools.
The criminals also used emails formatted to look like messages from the law firm. They contained details of foreign companies and accounts to which the money should be sent.
As a result, the CFO of Fideuram authorized the transfers on the instructions of the bank president. Most of the funds went to accounts in China and Hong Kong.
Soon, the bank's internal security systems detected suspicious activity. Fideuram engaged international banking cooperation mechanisms and began to recover the funds.
One of the Chinese banks blocked and returned about 40 million euros. Part of the funds was also stopped in other countries. Thus, of the approximately 95 million euros of initial transfers, most was returned.
At the same time, at least 36 million euros still remain unaccounted for. Investigators believe that some of this money was converted into cryptocurrency, which made tracking it significantly more difficult.
The investigation is being conducted by the Milan prosecutor's office. Law enforcement officers are trying to identify the participants in the international scheme and trace the movement of funds through foreign accounts and cryptocurrency assets.
The incident occurred amid the rapid spread of AI-based fraud. Voice deepfakes allow criminals to imitate the speech of executives, relatives or business partners and exploit trust between people to bypass standard verification procedures.
