AI-generated fake IDs are easily bypassing crypto exchange checks

Whenever an app asks you to take a photo of your ID laying on a desk, it assumes a real camera is capturing a real physical card. That assumption is officially dead.

According to an investigation by 404 Media, an underground website called OnlyFake is selling generated fake IDs for just $15, using neural networks to churn out hyper-realistic document photos in minutes.

A California driver's license on a fluffy carpet

Reporter Joseph Cox tested the site firsthand, and the results are alarming.

In just minutes, OnlyFake generated a convincing California driver's license featuring completely arbitrary names, addresses, expiration dates, and signatures.

To beat verification checks, the generated photo makes the ID look as if it is laying on a fluffy carpet, mimicking a casual snapshot taken on someone's floor.

Cox then took another fake document churned out by the service and submitted it to OKX, a major cryptocurrency exchange that has recently surfaced in multiple court records tied to cybercrime. The fake ID sailed right through the platform's verification check without a hitch.

Moving past Photoshop to Excel batch generation

Forging high-quality fake documents used to be a skilled craft requiring years of Photoshop practice, or buying physical counterfeits on the dark web and praying they did not get seized in the mail.

OnlyFake is turning the entire trade into an automated assembly line.

In a message on its Telegram channel, the service boldly declared that the era of rendering documents using Photoshop is coming to an end. It claims its generators can produce up to 20,000 documents a day.

The site owner, operating under the alias John Wick, told 404 Media that buyers can even feed the system an Excel spreadsheet to pump out hundreds of identity documents simultaneously.

Why it matters

We think this changes the math for online fraud completely.

It is not just that the fakes look convincing; it is the sheer speed and dirt-cheap price point. Lowering the cost of a workable fake ID to $15 and enabling bulk Excel imports turns identity fraud from a boutique criminal skill into automated spam.

For regular users, the risk of having cloned personas open accounts or wash funds under arbitrary details just skyrocketed. For fintech and crypto platforms, this is a massive wake-up call.

Services relying on static photo uploads for KYC verification are now practically wide open to anyone with pocket change. It will almost certainly force the industry to abandon static image verification and shift toward strict live biometric liveness checks, hardware NFC chip reads, or direct government registry lookups.