We’re entering a strange moment in digital life where seeing, hearing, or reading something is no longer enough to trust it. AI can now clone voices, mimic writing styles, generate fake videos, and imitate human behaviour with unsettling accuracy.
As these tools become more accessible, the real consumer challenge is no longer just spotting obvious scams, but figuring out how we determine who is actually real online.
The rise of AI-driven cyber threats hasn’t rendered passwords obsolete, but it has highlighted the critical need for multi-layered defence-in-depth to protect user accounts. We need to talk less about static credentials and focus on the deeper concept of identity integrity. Basically, the digital equivalent of the age-old principle of trusting what someone does rather than just what they say, notes Anna Collard, SVP, content strategy & CISO advisor for KnowBe4 Africa.
“The password isn’t dead, but the industry has moved toward a ‘Zero Trust’ model where a single set of credentials isn’t sufficient to grant access anymore,” says Collard. She points out that most modern breaches don’t involve sophisticated technical hacking, but rather the exploitation of exposed credentials. “Criminals obtain passwords through phishing or data leaks and simply log in as the user.
