The country’s two e-wallet giants, Maya Philippines, Inc. and GCash, said ransomware, phishing, and artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled attacks are among the biggest cybersecurity threats facing their platforms and consumers, with both companies integrating AI-based mechanisms to combat these threats.
Jan Martin Encina, Maya Philippines’ director of information security, told BusinessWorld that the fintech company’s consumers are constantly facing threats of account takeovers, while its employees have been targeted by phishing threats aimed at compromising their passwords and identities.
“As with any financial services industry, I think it’s not untypical for threats to be targeting our consumers, to be able to get information from them or take over their accounts and make them victims of fraud,” Mr. Encina said in an interview on the sidelines of the BusinessWorld Cybersecurity Summit on Tuesday.
“It’s also not untypical for financial services companies like us for our employees to be targeted by phishing, by people trying to compromise their passwords and their identities,” Mr. Encina said. He also noted that the said threats have remained persistent throughout the years.
For GCash chief risk officer Ingrid Rose Ann Beroña, ransomware and AI-powered social engineering — or the use of AI to manipulate people into divulging sensitive information — are among the company’s biggest cyber threats.
“Ransomware, that’s the known cyber security attack out there,” Ms. Beroña said. “The use of AI in social engineering would also be one of the cyber attacks because it’s not technically attacking the systems per se, but attacking the consumers that can now lead to the attack towards your technology and business,” she added.
AI are being leveraged by attackers because it scales up their attacks and helps make them more convincing, Mr. Encina said.
“With AI, you can actually scale that up, take that victim count from 10 to 10,000. You can create better emails, get rid of all the grammatical errors that you see in phishing attacks,” he said.
Global cybersecurity firm Fortinet warned that cyberattacks in 2026 are expected to be executed by autonomous AI systems capable of infiltrating networks, stealing data, and deploying ransomware without human oversight, based on its Cyber Threat Predictions Report.
By 2027, the global cost of cybercrime is projected to exceed US$23 trillion, driven by industrialized ransomware operations, automated fraud networks, and the convergence of traditional crime and cyber syndicates, according to the World Economic Forum.
In response, Mr. Encina said that Maya has implemented technical safeguards on its platform, including multi-factor authentication and biometric authentication, to strengthen account security and prevent unauthorized access. He added that the company continuously conducts employee training on how to spot phishing and other related attacks.
Maya also uses AI to detect anomalies more quickly.
Meanwhile, Ms. Beroña said that GCash, which caters to over 94 million consumers, remains a secure platform regardless of the volume of transactions. The fintech company is also constantly seeking the best providers and technologies, including AI-driven solutions, to ensure the security of its platform. — Edg Adrian A. Eva
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