Closer to home: How AI is reshaping tenancy fraud in the social housing sector

Tenancy fraud isn’t new to the social housing sector – but AI is making it smarter and harder to catch.

Fraud across the housing sector is rapidly evolving. With Artificial Intelligence (AI) driving increases in deepfakes, synthetic identities, and document forgery, landlords and housing associations must keep pace by evolving their fraud prevention and detection.

According to Cifas Fraudscape 2026, there has been a significant surge in false and altered documents linked to tenant referencing – fuelled in part by AI-generated forgeries. More concerningly, some AI-generated identities and supporting documents are now bypassing standard verification checks. Research by MRI Software found that only 26% of 200 AI-generated IDs were flagged by industry-standard solutions, highlighting a gap between fraud capability and detection effectiveness.

Daniel Sibthorpe, Director of Cyber Security and Counter Fraud, recently delivered a session to the Social Housing Investigation Partnership, part of the South West London Fraud Partnership run by Wandsworth Council, exploring how AI is reshaping the threat landscape in housing and how landlords and housing associations can stay ahead of emerging risks.

Audience participation offered interesting insight into how counter fraud practitioners are currently experiencing this shift:

• Document fraud is the top concern - Most respondents pointed to document forgery and manipulation, reflecting how easily high-quality fraudulent documents can now be created with AI, as an area of risk.
• Detection is difficult - While 45% of respondents suspected they had encountered AI-generated documents as part of their role, only 15% had confirmed this. A further 26% reported no exposure at all, and 13% were not sure if they had encountered an AI-generated document, suggesting the issue is likely going undetected rather than not occurring.
• The challenge extends beyond documentation - When presented with one real voice recording and one AI-generated recording, only 60% of respondents correctly identified the fake, underlining how convincingly AI can now replicate human speech patterns and intonation.

These findings highlight the difficulties faced by frontline staff when detecting AI-generated identity documents – a challenge that is likely to affect all sectors responsible for handling such documentation.

AI is enabling criminals to commit fraud at greater speed, scale, and sophistication.

• Generating convincing identity documents, utility bills, payslips, and references as part of their application.
• Using deepfakes during live ID verification, interviews, and reference calls.
• Deploying bots to mass-apply for properties and outpace genuine applicants.
• Manipulating listings or pricing to deceive users into overpaying deposits.
• Impersonating property agents to deceive landlords, tenants or staff into disclosing sensitive information.
• Fabricating property damage in photographs to support fraudulent insurance claims.

• Adopt AI-powered detection tools to identify synthetic documents, behavioural anomalies, and inconsistencies across documents.
• Reduce reliance on documents alone by corroborating information from multiple sources.
• Probe deeper with targeted questions, e.g. asking questions around unusual patterns on bank statements.
• Look for behavioural red flags, such as urgency, avoidance, inconsistencies, and reluctance to send original documentation.
• Introduce live verification checks where applicants are asked to hold up their ID next to their face in real-time. Asking applicants to move their heads side to side and to hold up three fingers in front of their faces can help identify deepfakes in some circumstances.
• As fraud thrives on urgency, deliberate friction on suspicious applications, delays before approval, and varied document requests can help.
• Check document metadata for anomalies in file size, title, authorship, and timestamps.

While it is not possible to identify every instance of fraud, maintaining awareness of emerging threats and implementing layered controls can significantly enhance detection and prevention of incidents.

Our Cyber Security and Counter Fraud team are always on hand to support you. Contact our team or your usual Crowe contact if you would like to discuss how we can help strengthen your identity verification process and overall resilience to fraud.