Christmas, advertising, warning signals: brand safety in influencer marketing

A year full of risks

The visibility of many brands skyrockets in December: Holiday campaigns, creator collaborations, discount promotions and product launches flood social media. But the greater the attention, the greater the target. It is precisely during this phase that the number of deepfakes, fake ads and manipulated creator content explodes.

While brands are fighting for the attention of their target groups, fraudsters are fighting for something else: their identity.

2025 has shown that brand safety is no longer a marginal issue, but the foundation of responsible creator communication. And deepfakes are the reason for this.

When reality becomes an illusion: Deepfakes that shook social media

Deepfakes are no longer a technical experiment, they are a mass-produced fraud tool. And they hit the very industry whose currency is trust. Business Insider provided one of the most spectacular examples:
An employee of an international company held a video call with several "colleagues". Everyone seemed familiar, all the voices and faces were convincing. But none of the people in the meeting existed, all of the colleagues were AI-generated deepfakes. The employee transferred millions to fraudsters.

But the wave goes deeper into the creator ecosystem.

In 2024, a deceptively real video circulated on Facebook in which Elon Musk allegedly advertised a new AI trading platform. A 61-year-old man lost several hundred euros after trusting the fake.Shortly before this, MrBeast was also affected: An AI-generated advertising clip promised iPhones for two US dollars in the YouTuber's name. The fake went viral before fact checks exposed it. Eparticularly drastic example made international headlines in early 2024: Superstar Taylor Swift was the victim of a wave of sexually explicit deepfakes that spread rapidly via X (Twitter) and porn platforms, without any basis in reality.

Deepfakes are no longer an abstract danger, they are part of everyday life.

A point of attack that brands have long underestimated

In traditional marketing, systems are protected: passwords, firewalls, platform access. But in influencer marketing, the danger lies elsewhere: in human identity itself. Faces, voices, gestures, brand-typical messages - everything can be imitated today.

Fraud0 shows how quickly fake advertising escalates: Fake collaborations, abused creator likability, manipulated product placements and all this on platforms that reward speed, not truth. The result is a loss of control in real time. Brands often only notice deepfakes when they go viral. This is why influencer marketing, of all things, is so susceptible to this. Influencer marketing is based on authenticity: people trust people. But it is precisely this human level that is the easiest to fake. If a creator suddenly appears to be promoting an investment product, even though the clip is fake, the trust of their community is turned against the brand. If a deepfake video with a brand logo suggests that a campaign exists that never did, not only the brand suffers, but also the creator. The biggest danger is not the fake itself, but the speed at which it spreads. Deepfake clips reach millions before they are exposed.

How IROIN® helps brands to make trust measurable

At a time when deepfakes are shaking the foundations of digital credibility, brands need a system that not only promises stability, but makes it structurally possible. This is exactly where the IROIN® Influencer Marketing Suite comes in: It creates a framework in which trust is not merely perceived intuitively, but becomes comprehensible based on data. The platform combines analysis, control and relationship management in a process that enables brands to regain control without restricting creativity.

The first line of defense

Every secure campaign starts with a central question: Which creator do we give our reach, our message and our brand identity to?

Discovery answers this question by sorting creators not by surface indicators such as reach or hype, but by true fit: by the tonality of their communication, the structure of their community and the subject areas in which they operate. The system analyzes engagement patterns, topics and reveals who is consistently authentic and who is merely trend-driven.

The integrated Relations feature makes Discovery particularly valuable. It adds a network perspective to the creator analysis: Which brands does a creator mention organically? Who tags them? Which profiles does he interact with regularly and which competitors appear in his environment? Relations reveals how a creator is positioned in the industry ecosystem and whether this network is stable, trustworthy or potentially risky for a brand. Precisely in times when identities can be manipulated, Relations offers social listening of the creator landscape that helps brands to recognize patterns at an early stage.

Real-time control

Trust is not a state that is achieved once and then managed. It is dynamic. A viral comment, a misunderstood clip or an unfortunate shift in context is enough to tip a campaign over the edge. With IROIN® Campaigning, brands operate in the moment, not after the fact. All creative processes: Briefings, coordination, content approvals, performance data, converge in one space. This creates an overview that is crucial in critical situations. If a mood changes or content unexpectedly gains reach, you can react immediately: Pause posts, sharpen messages, inform creators. Campaigning transforms monitoring from a passive look at figures into an active form of brand management that can react to changes in real time.

Trust that lasts

Security does not end with the last post. Especially in an environment in which digital identities can be copied and manipulated, the consistency of the relationship between brand and creator is more important than ever. Influencer Relationship Management from IROIN® acts as a long-term memory of these relationships. It documents communication, content histories, engagement histories and potential risk signals.

This makes it possible to track how a creator develops: whether their content remains consistent, whether their audience is stable, whether there are signs of a change in topics or tonality. Brands can recognize early on whether a collaboration is still based on shared values or whether a risk is emerging before it is reflected in the feed. IRM creates a culture of safety that is based on transparency rather than strict control. It supports brands in cultivating relationships that are sustainable in the long term, exactly the opposite of the manipulative dynamics that make deepfakes possible today.

Trust is no longer a feeling, but a measurable key figure

December, when advertising pressure, emotions and willingness to buy are at their highest, is also when the risk of fake ads going viral is greatest. Brand safety is therefore not an end-of-year issue, but a riskometer for the start of the year: brands that rely on gut feeling are risking their credibility. Brands that rely on data protect their identity. With IROIN® Discovery, Campaigning and IRM, brands have a system that enables them to manage campaigns with confidence, not out of fear, but out of responsibility. Because in a world where every voice, every face and every cooperation can be copied, the future belongs to those who can prove authenticity.