Debuting at Black Hat USA 2026, BlackCloak's circle of trust enhancement validates the authenticity of calls, messages, and emails - protecting not just executives but the family members, wealth advisors, lawyers, executive assistants, and caregivers around them, on any platform.
LAS VEGAS, July 28, 2026 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- BLACK HAT -- Deepfakes have made one of our oldest assumptions unreliable: that you can trust a familiar face or voice. While the industry focuses mainly on building "in-line detection tools" that try to spot the fake, BlackCloak, the leader in Digital Executive Protection (DEP), built Impersonation Protection to focus on validating the authenticity of communications. Announced today ahead of Black Hat USA 2026, where it will be demonstrated live at Booth #5926, circle of trust functionality is the most significant expansion of that capability to date — giving executives and high-profile individuals a powerful new way to confirm the authenticity of communications from their trusted contacts.
The threat is no longer theoretical. Research commissioned by BlackCloak from the Ponemon Institute found that 42% of respondents say their executives and board members have already been targeted at least once by a fake image or video, and 59% say deepfake attacks are very or highly difficult to detect. Generative AI has lowered the technical barrier for attackers, and traditional in-line detection cannot cover every channel an executive actually uses such as personal phones, FaceTime, the WhatsApp thread, the family group text chat. Attackers know this, and they aim for the personal lives of these executives on the channels corporate controls cannot reach.
Industry analysts are raising similar concerns around disinformation security.
According to a Gartner® Report*, "Examples of disinformation attacks include targeting employees with social engineering using deepfakes or propagating malicious narratives online via fake websites, deepfaked media and impersonated social media profiles to phish customers or manipulate financials. Evidence shows the urgency: 36% of respondents to a 2025 Gartner survey said their organization had experienced social engineering with a deepfake in a video call with an employee. Without clear ownership and cross-functional effort, fragmented responses will leave organizations vulnerable to industrial attacks targeting reputation and episodic attacks targeting individuals."
Gartner defines episodic attacks as "individual attacks at a moment in time, often with a narrow goal — for example, to trick an employee into transferring funds or specifically harm the reputation of an executive." We think this is precisely the category BlackCloak's Impersonation Protection is built to address: the single, high-stakes moment when an executive, an assistant, or a family member must decide whether the person on the other end is real.
"You can't spot every fake, but you can confirm the authenticity of communications with your trusted circle," said Dr. Chris Pierson, Founder and CEO of BlackCloak. "Believing under some false pretense that cybercriminals will only target "official corporate" modes of communication as opposed to just picking up the phone and calling or texting is the root cause for incorrect assumptions and control ineffectiveness. We are not in the detection arms race. Detection asks whether the content is fake. Impersonation Protection with the expanded feature, circle of trust, answers the question that actually matters: is the person communicating with me now really that member of my circle who is already trusted and on the BlackCloak platform? By anchoring trust to the person, on a channel the attacker doesn't control, we neutralize impersonation, deepfake, and social engineering attacks at the moment of decision."
How Impersonation Protection Works
Already protecting BlackCloak members today, Impersonation Protection enables members to authenticate phone calls, video meetings, emails, WhatsApp and Slack messages, texts, and other communications in real time. BlackCloak moves the security control out of the potentially compromised channel, and puts the focus on the basis of trust between the two parties. It starts with a simple question - who really sent me this message? From that starting point, Impersonation Protection provides users with a secure way to ensure that the message originated from a trusted source.
The expanded capability, introduced with circle of trust as part of Impersonation Protection, extends this functionality beyond BlackCloak's membership. Members can now invite the people they trust most: family members, wealth advisors, lawyers, executive assistants, caregivers, and household staff, into their own circle of trust. Invited contacts download a free version of the BlackCloak app, register their device, and can then both send and receive authentication requests with the member.
"An executive's trust network doesn't stop at the corporate directory, and neither do the attackers," said Matt Covington, SVP of Product at BlackCloak. "The assistant approving a wire, the advisor moving funds, the caregiver picking up a child, these are the relationships threat actors exploit. This enhancement brings every one of them inside the same authenticated perimeter."
Capabilities of Impersonation Protection with circle of trust include:
- Anchored to the person and their device, not the message. The trusted contact responds to an authentication request at the moment of decision, on a channel the attacker doesn't control.
- Built on the basis of trust. Confirmation happens separately from the potentially compromised communication channel.
- Privacy-first validation. Biometric checks can use the device's built-in authentication features; BlackCloak never collects or stores biometric data.
- A record on both sides. Confirmations are preserved for both parties, creating an audit trail of authenticated communications.
Availability
Impersonation Protection is available now as an add-on to the BlackCloak platform. The circle of trust enhancement will be included as part of Impersonation Protection and generally available to members in early fall. Both will be demonstrated live at Black Hat USA 2026, August 5–6 at Mandalay Bay, Booth #5926.
BlackCloak is available for private briefings at Black Hat USA 2026 in Las Vegas, August 5–6. To request a meeting, visit https://blackcloak.io/black-hat-2026/.
*Gartner Report, Fight AI Disinformation — A CISO Playbook for Working with Your CIO, CCO and CMO, By Akif Khan, October 2025. Gartner is a trademark of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates.
About BlackCloak
BlackCloak protects corporate executives, board members, high-profile individuals, and their families from privacy, financial, and other reputational risks. Used by Fortune 500 companies across all industries, the BlackCloak Concierge Cybersecurity & Privacy™ Platform is a comprehensive solution that includes mobile and desktop apps and concierge support. Executives and high-profile individuals gain complete peace of mind knowing their family, reputation, and finances are secured. Companies rest assured that their brand, intellectual property, data, and finances are protected against threats from executives without invading their personal lives. Learn more at www.blackcloak.io and follow us on LinkedIn.
Media Contact
Beth Trier, BlackCloak, 1 4156018104, [email protected], https://blackcloak.io/
SOURCE BlackCloak
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