Nubank lays off just over 30 in fraud investigation team after automating reviews with AI

Summary written by the Panorama newsroom from the sources listed below. Facts are attributed to the original publications.

Nubank has decided to dismantle the team responsible for analyzing complaints about financial fraud after it began using artificial intelligence tools for the task, according to a report by Folha de S.Paulo based on accounts from current and former employees who requested anonymity. Part of the team, however, is still handling complaints while the bank prepares the restructuring.

According to the newspaper, just over 30 people from the unit, known internally as "investigations," were laid off on the morning of Tuesday (Nov. 3) in virtual meetings with small groups. Some of the dismissals were communicated by email. The workers were let go without cause and will receive severance pay.

The accounts indicate that the bank started using AI to analyze fraud complaints about six months ago. Since then, the queue of scam complaints has reportedly shrunk by 80%. At first, the systems handled the simplest cases, and part of the team was reassigned to merely validate the results; corrections made by the analysts were used to train the language model.

The cuts mainly hit the group that investigated so-called mule accounts, used by criminals to spread out money obtained through online scams. Before the layoffs, about 40 employees had already been moved to other areas, and the remaining analysts are limited to the most complex cases.

In a statement, Nubank said it is still hiring for other roles and that the restructuring of part of an administrative area led to the reassignment of staff and the elimination of some positions. The company said those affected will receive a package that includes additional pay based on length of service and a temporary extension of health insurance.