Australian Catholics’ hopes are high for a papal visit as they express delight in the election of American-born Robert Prevost as the church’s global leader.

Cardinal Prevost will be known by the name Pope Leo XIV and is the first American and first native English-speaker to be appointed to lead the faith.

Brisbane Archbishop Mark Coleridge said he had been impressed during their previous meetings and always thought the Chicago native was a “rough chance” to become Pope.

“But I was surprised when I woke early to the news of his election as Pope Leo XIV – I was also delighted,” he said.

Archbishop Coleridge said despite a rapid rise, Pope Leo wasn’t a man to “rush things” and had an air of calm that would serve him well.

“He struck me as a man who … was hard to fluster, a good driver in heavy traffic … he will be his own man,” he said.

Melbourne Archbishop Peter Andrew Comensoli has met Pope Leo several times, saying he was a “great listener” with “wide experience and great depth of faith”.

“Clearly the cardinals were confident that they chose Cardinal Prevost,” Archbishop Comensoli told AAP.

“We have a chief shepherd and we will all look forward to getting a sense of him, as he begins his ministry.”

Sydney Archbishop Anthony Fisher said the Chicago native’s “missionary heart” would make him a unifier and peacemaker.

“He’s in a very divided world and the divisions in culture, politics, diplomacy and the rest of the world have infected the church too,” Archbishop Fisher said.

“This Pope is a very centrist kind of Pope and so that might make him less controversial.”

The Sydney archbishop sees no reason why Australia won’t soon have its first sovereign pontiff visit since Pope Benedict XVI in 2008. 

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has invited Pope Leo to visit Sydney in 2028 for the International Eucharistic Congress. 

Archbishop Fisher is confident the pontiff will travel down under after backing Australia’s candidacy to host the event. 

“So we’ve got a foot in the door for making sure he comes to our Eucharistic Congress,” the Archbishop said. 

Leo spent decades as a missionary in Peru, before Pope Francis appointed him to lead the Vatican’s bishop selection process.

Mr Albanese said the appointment brought joy and hope to Catholics.

“May the papacy of Pope Leo advance the cause of peace and social justice for all humanity,” he said.

Churchgoers in Sydney celebrated the new Pope by attending mass at St Mary’s Cathedral. 

“I’m not even Christian … but this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see these events,” Shantipack Chomsin told AAP. 

“It feels like everything is right again and we have something to look forward to, so it’s fantastic news,” Lauren Walker said.

Australian Catholic Bishops Conference president Archbishop Timothy Costelloe offered heartfelt congratulations. 

“Cardinal Prevost brought to his most recent role as Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops an approachability and willingness to listen which were no doubt developed throughout his many years as an Augustinian missionary in Peru,” he said.

Catholic Social Services Australia executive director Jerry Nockles said Pope Leo’s appointment came at a critical time when the world yearned for compassionate leadership grounded in gospel values of justice, dignity and solidarity with the vulnerable.

Cardinal Mykola Bychok was the sole Australian representative at the conclave in Rome. 

Archbishop Costelloe and Sale Bishop Greg Bennet have indicated they will travel to Rome for the installation, representing the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference and the church in Australia.

Julie Fragar has won the $100,000 Archibald Prize with a portrait of fellow artist Justene Williams to “honour the incredible multiverse of artworks that seems always to be exploding from her”.

The winning work is titled Flagship Mother Multiverse (Justene), and depicts the artist floating among the stars above the materials of making art, her daughter looking on.

Fragar has been a finalist in the Archibald four times, and burst into tears when Art Gallery of NSW director Maud Page called Friday morning to tell her she had won.

“It feels unbelievable, can you imagine? I’m from a small country town originally, I moved to Sydney to go to art school, so to win the Archibald is amazing,” Fragar said after the announcement in Sydney.

She described the win as an incredible honour and her longtime friend and colleague Williams as an extraordinary artist.

“I wanted to honour the incredible multiverse of artworks that seems always to be exploding from her, spinning not quite out of control,” the Brisbane artist said.

“The work is a reflection on the experience of making art to deadlines and the labour and love of being a mother.”

The title of the winning work comes from Williams’ recent endurance performance in New Zealand, titled Making do rhymes with poo, about juggling a day job with art making and motherhood.

It’s the third year in a row a female artist has won the Archibald, making Fragar the 13th woman to win since the prize started in 1921.

“Here are two of Australia’s great artists in conversation about what matters most to them,” said Page, who was announced in March as the gallery’s new director.

Fragar conducted a photo session with Williams and spent three months in the studio working on the painting, which she hoped would communicate her subject’s singularity and otherworldliness.

The winner was selected from 903 entries and 57 finalists, with works painted in the past year from at least one live sitting.

The award, widely regarded as Australia’s most prestigious art prize, is judged by the trustees of the Art Gallery of NSW, who made a unanimous decision on Friday.

Jude Rae has won the $50,000 Wynne Prize for landscape painting or sculpture, for the oil on linen work Pre-dawn sky over Port Botany container terminal.

The $40,000 Sulman Prize for genre painting went to Katoomba-based artist Gene A’Hern for Sky painting, beating a record field of 732 entries.

For the first time in 2025, women artists made up the majority of finalists in each of the Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prize competitions.

Earlier in May, the $3000 Packing Room Prize selected by the gallery’s art handling staff went to Abdul Abdullah for a portrait of his friend Jason Phu.

The finalists for all three prizes will be on show at the Art Gallery of New South Wales from Saturday until August 17, before touring Victoria and NSW.

American Robert Prevost’s elevation to the papacy is being welcomed by Australian Catholics, who say he “will be his own man” in the role.

Cardinal Prevost will be known by the name Pope Leo XIV and is the first American and first native English-speaker to be appointed to the lead the faith.

Brisbane Archbishop Mark Coleridge said he had been impressed during their previous meetings and always thought the Chicago native was a “rough chance” to become Pope.

“But I was surprised when I woke early to the news of his election as Pope Leo XIV – I was also delighted,” he said.

Archbishop Coleridge said despite a rapid rise Pope Leo wasn’t a man to “rush things” and had an air of calm that would serve him well in his new role.

“He struck me as a man who … was hard to fluster, a good driver in heavy traffic … he will be his own man,” he said.

Melbourne Archbishop Peter Andrew Comensoli had also met Pope Leo several times, saying he was a “great listener” with “wide experience and great depth of faith”.

“Clearly the cardinals were confident that they chose Cardinal Prevost,” Archbishop Comensoli told AAP.

“It’s great news. We have a chief shepherd and we will all look forward to getting a sense of him, as he begins his ministry.”

The Chicago native’s “missionary heart” would hold him in good stead, Sydney Archbishop Anthony Fisher said.

“Like the late Pope Francis, Pope Leo XIV will bring to the church the experience of being part of a religious order with an emphasis on simplicity and community,” he said.

“It was very moving that the Holy Father opened his first address to a watching world with a greeting of peace, and repeated the central truth of the gospel, that God loves all of us ‘without any limits or conditions’.”

Leo spent decades as a missionary in Peru, before Pope Francis appointed him to lead the Vatican’s bishop selection process.

Archbishop Fisher, along with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, invited Leo to the International Eucharistic Congress, to be hosted in Sydney in 2028.

Mr Albanese said the appointment brought joy and hope to Catholics everywhere.

“May the papacy of Pope Leo advance the cause of peace and social justice for all humanity,” he said.

Australian Catholic Bishops Conference president Archbishop Timothy Costelloe offered the Catholic church in Australia’s heartfelt congratulations.

“Cardinal Prevost brought to his most recent role as Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops an approachability and willingness to listen which were no doubt developed throughout his many years as an Augustinian missionary in Peru,” he said.

Catholic Social Services Australia executive director Jerry Nockles said Pope Leo’s appointment came at a critical time when the world yearned for compassionate leadership grounded in gospel values of justice, dignity and solidarity with the vulnerable.

“Pope Leo’s election offers a beacon of hope and a powerful reminder that the church stands firmly for peace and with those on the margins,” Dr Nockles said.

Cardinal Mykola Bychok was the sole Australian representative at the conclave in Rome.

Archbishop Costelloe and Sale Bishop Greg Bennet have indicated they will travel to Rome for the installation representing the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference and the church in Australia.

Anthony Albanese has warned Labor MPs not to let the government’s dominant election victory go to their heads as fresh faces joined the party room.

The prime minister called for unity and discipline, and for his members not to focus inwards in a speech twice interrupted by a ringing phone.

It follows a brutal move by internal powerbrokers to dump two cabinet ministers.

“We don’t seek power for its own sake, not to decide who’s in what part of the building,” Mr Albanese told a caucus meeting in Canberra on Friday, in a reference to people sitting in the ministerial wing or backbench offices.

“We seek power in order to deliver for the people who need Labor to be in government and to develop a better nation.”

The prime minister urged his party to focus on Australians who voted for them, each and every day. 

“My final ask of you is that over the next three years, we remain laser-like focused on them.”

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus and Industry Minister Ed Husic have been axed from the ministry as Labor’s more progressive left and more conservative right factions carve up the 30 spots.

Mr Dreyfus will be replaced in the ministry by Victorian MP Sam Rae, a factional ally of deputy prime minister Richard Marles who hails from the same state.

Mr Husic brushed the first caucus meeting, after being dumped to rebalance the ledger between the NSW and Victorian right, with the former over-represented in cabinet as spots are decided on a proportional basis between factions and states.

Labor senators Jess Walsh and Tim Ayres will also be promoted, as will MP Daniel Mulino.

The new ministers would be highly effective and work hard but this would not diminish the pain of the two dumped senior MPs, health minister Mark Butler said.

There were democratic processes where people put themselves forward to colleagues which “can mean that a whole lot of people who either have a lot of experience or a lot of potential miss out,” he told reporters.

But Labor luminary and former prime minister Paul Keating blasted “factional lightweights” for demoting Mr Husic as the cabinet’s sole Muslim member and Mr Dreyfus as the most senior Jewish MP.

It showed contempt for the Muslim community who supported Labor, he said, while savaging Mr Albanese for failing to intervene.

The prime minister will allocate portfolios over the weekend ahead of the ministry being sworn in on Tuesday.

Labor’s first caucus was all men and now women will outnumber them in the party room, Mr Albanese said to resounding applause.

Women are set to hold at least 46 of Labor’s 90 seats.

“I also see people of different ethnicities, different backgrounds, different experiences, different faiths,” he said.

Across the dispatch box, the Liberals are also looking for a refresh after Peter Dutton became the first opposition leader to lose his seat, with deputy leader Sussan Ley officially throwing her hat into the ring on Friday.

Shadow treasurer Angus Taylor is also contending, with rumours Jacinta Nampijinpa Price could run as his deputy after defecting from the Nationals party room to sit with the Liberals.

The party’s immigration spokesman Dan Tehan ruled himself out of any leadership role.

Greens MPs will meet on Thursday to choose a new leader after Adam Bandt lost his Melbourne seat.

Brisbane artist Julie Fragar has won the $100,000 Archibald Prize with her portrait of fellow artist Justene Williams.

The winning work is titled Flagship Mother Multiverse (Justene), and is painted in grayscale, showing the artist floating among the stars.

The title comes from Williams’ recent endurance performance in New Zealand – Making do rhymes with poo – about the labour of juggling a day job with art making and motherhood.

Fragar has been a finalist in the Archibald four times, and burst into tears when Art Gallery of New South Wales director Maud Page called Friday morning to tell her she had won.

“To be the winner of the Archibald Prize is a point of validation. It means so much to have the respect of my colleagues at the Art Gallery. It doesn’t get better than that,” she said.

She also paid tribute to her subject, Justene Williams, describing her as a dear friend and an extraordinary artist who has a “multiverse of artwork” spinning from her.

“Justene is incredible. I feel very fortunate that she allowed me to do this portrait. There is nobody like her,” said Fragar.

“The work is a reflection on the experience of making art to deadlines, and the labour and love of being a mother.”

The winner was selected from 903 entries and 57 finalists, with entries painted in the past year from at least one live sitting.

The award, widely regarded as Australia’s most prestigious art prize, is judged by the trustees of the Art Gallery of New South Wales.

Jude Rae has won the $50,000 Wynne Prize for landscape painting or sculpture, for the oil on linen work Pre-dawn sky over Port Botany container terminal.

The $40,000 Sulman Prize for genre painting went to Katoomba-based artist Gene A’Hern for Sky painting, beating a record field of 732 entries.

Ms Page, who was announced in March as the new director of the Art Gallery of New South Wales, said the winning work showed two of Australia’s great artists in conversation about what matters most to them.

“Julie Fragar has a sumptuous ability to transcend reality and depict her subjects technically but also psychologically,” she said.

“Justene Williams is a larger-than-life character, a performer – cacophonous and joyous.”

For the first time in 2025, women artists made up the majority of finalists in each of the Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prize competitions.

Earlier in May, the $3000 Packing Room Prize selected by the gallery’s art handling staff went to Abdul Abdullah for a portrait of his friend Jason Phu.

The finalists for all three prizes will be on show at the Art Gallery of New South Wales from Saturday until August 17, before touring Victoria and across NSW.

Japanese stocks jumped on Friday, supported by the dollar’s surge against the yen, after a US trade deal with Britain fuelled hopes of progress in tariff talks with other countries.

Bitcoin soared to the highest since January and US crude ticked up after a more than 3.0 per cent surge on Thursday, when President Donald Trump announced the agreement with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer – the first in the month since Trump started a 90-day pause on trade tariffs to allow room for negotiations.

At the same time, concerns that the limited trade agreement with London may not provide much of a blueprint for additional deals cooled optimism around the outcome of Sino-US trade talks set for Saturday in Switzerland.

Mainland blue chips started the day 0.2 per cent lower, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.2 per cent.

Japan’s Nikkei and broader Topix each climbed about 1.2 per cent, with the Topix set to extend its winning streak to an 11th session, the longest run since October 2017.

Taiwan’s equity benchmark advanced 1.0 per cent, while Australian stocks added 0.4 per cent.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was broadly flat.

“The deal between the US and UK was more style over substance,” said Kyle Rodda, a senior financial markets analyst at Capital.com.

“However, it feeds the narrative that the US is looking to bang-out rapid fire trade deals and reduce tariffs – at the margins – and other trade barriers,” Rodda said.

“Constructive language and statements of intent will likely be enough to drive stocks higher off the back of the US-China trade talks.”

Trump pushed back against seeing the UK deal as a template for other negotiations.

The “general terms” agreement leaves in place a 10 per cent tariff on goods imported from the UK but lowers prohibitive US duties on UK car exports. Britain agreed to lower its tariffs to 1.8 per cent from 5.1 per cent and provide greater access to US goods.

Last week, Trump said he has “potential” trade deals with India, South Korea and Japan.

Nymex crude ticked up 0.2 per cent to $US60.02 ($A93.75) per barrel early on Friday, building on the previous day’s 3.2 per cent surge. Brent crude added 0.3 per cent to $US63 ($A98) per barrel, following Thursday’s 2.8 per cent rally.

Safe-haven gold continued its slide, weakening 0.5 per cent to around 3,288 an ounce, after dropping 3.6 per cent in the past two sessions.

The US dollar index, which measures the currency against six major peers, edged up 0.1 per cent to reach a one-month peak at 100.77.

The euro sagged to a one-month trough at $US1.1210 ($A1.7510)5, and sterling slipped to a three-week low of $US1.3220 ($A2.0650)5.

The yen ticked up slightly to 145.77 per dollar, but that was after a 1.5 per cent tumble on Thursday, when it touched a one-month low of 146.175.

Higher US Treasury yields helped support the greenback, with the 10-year yield steady at 4.3687 per cent following Thursday’s 10-basis point jump as demand for the safety of bonds ebbed.

Bitcoin was also buoyed by the improvement in market sentiment, rising to the highest since January 31 at $US103,090.17 ($A161,025.89), and closing the distance with the all-time high from January 20 at $US109,071.86 ($A170,369.24).

Standard Chartered’s Geoffrey Kendrick no longer sees risk sentiment as the main driver for the world’s biggest cryptocurrency.

“It is now all about flows, and flows are coming in many forms,” said Kendrick, the bank’s global head of digital assets research, pointing to an influx of cash into bitcoin ETFs, as well as buying by so-called whales.

“I think a fresh all-time high for bitcoin is coming soon,” he said. 

“I apologise that my $US120,000 ($A187,000) Q2 target may be too low.”

Julie Fragar has won the $100,000 Archibald Prize with her portrait of fellow artist Justene Williams.

The winning work is titled Flagship Mother Multiverse (Justene), and is painted in grayscale, showing the artist floating among the stars.

The title comes from Williams’ recent endurance performance in New Zealand – Making do rhymes with poo – about the labour of juggling a day job with art making and motherhood. 

The winner was selected from 903 entries and 57 finalists, with entries painted in the past year from at least one live sitting.

The award, widely regarded as Australia’s most prestigious art prize, is judged by the trustees of the Art Gallery of New South Wales.

Jude Rae has won the $50,000 Wynne Prize for landscape painting or sculpture, for the oil on linen work Pre-dawn sky over Port Botany container terminal.

The $40,000 Sulman Prize for genre painting went to Katoomba-based artist Gene A’Hern for Sky painting, beating a record field of 732 entries.

Maud Page, who was announced in March as the new director of the Art Gallery of New South Wales, has congratulated all of the artists who entered the 2025 awards.

For the first time in 2025, women artists made up the majority of finalists in each of the Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prize competitions.

Earlier in May, the $3000 Packing Room Prize selected by the gallery’s art handling staff went to Abdul Abdullah for a portrait of his friend Jason Phu.

The finalists for all three prizes will be on show at the Art Gallery of New South Wales from Saturday until August 17, before touring Victoria and NSW.

Blood is being spilled across the political aisle as party leaderships are on the table and powerbrokers carve up the spoils of victory.

Deputy Liberal leader Sussan Ley has officially announced her tilt at the leadership, confirming she will put herself forward to refresh a decimated party.

The Liberals will meet in Canberra on Tuesday to choose a new leader, with shadow treasurer Angus Taylor also courting colleagues for the top job.

“I’m determined and convinced that I am the right person to lead the party forward at this time and I think my appointment would send a strong signal to the women of Australia,” Ms Ley told Seven’s Sunrise on Friday.

Ms Ley acknowledged the Liberals suffered a significant defeat and needed to “meet the Australian people where they are, because clearly we didn’t do that at the last election”.

The bloodletting continues ahead of Tuesday’s meeting as the coalition’s Indigenous Australians spokeswoman Jacinta Nampijinpa Price defected from sitting with the National Party to the Liberals.

As a Country Liberal Party senator from the Northern Territory, she can choose to sit in either partyroom but the spot has historically sided with the Nationals.

Her colleagues have expressed disappointment as it means the loss of a Nationals senator takes the party below the five needed in the Senate to receive entitlements offered to larger parties.

Queensland MP Michelle Landry branded it disloyal.

“We’re all very upset that she’s decided to move over to the Liberals and I just think that there’s a lack of loyalty there,” she told ABC radio.

Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie accused the Liberals of actively recruiting Senator Nampijinpa Price five days out from an election.

“That is not the behaviour of trusted partners,” she told Sky News.

“I’ve been on the phone late into last night with territorians in the CLP very concerned about this decision and what it means for them and their representation.”

People who ran under one party and then jumped ship when they were elected should be disendorsed and run under their own banner, Ms Landry said.

Senator Price is rumoured to be pushing for the deputy Liberal leadership under Mr Taylor but hasn’t officially confirmed a tilt.

“To be quite honest, it is something that I wanted to do from the first time I was elected (in 2022) … and chose at that time that I needed to sit in the National partyroom,” she told Sydney radio station 2GB.

Tony Abbott had spoken to her and supported the move, she said.

Despite its landslide win, Labor hasn’t emerged unscathed in the election aftermath with a brutal move from internal powerbrokers resulting in two cabinet ministers being dumped to make way for fresh faces.

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus and Industry Minister Ed Husic were axed from the ministry as Labor’s more progressive left and more conservative right factions carved up the 30 spots.

Mr Dreyfus will be replaced in the ministry by Victorian MP Sam Rae, a factional ally of Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles who hails from the same state.

Mr Husic was dumped to rebalance the ledger between the NSW and Victorian right with the former over represented in cabinet as spots are decided on a proportional basis between factions and states.

Health Minister Mark Butler said the government had to “balance stability with some renewal”, acknowledging it was tough for the two senior MPs.

“But that’s how democratic processes work,” he told ABC TV.

Labor senators Jess Walsh and Tim Ayres will also be promoted.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will address caucus on Friday where the ministerial nominations will be rubber-stamped.

Mr Albanese will then allocate portfolios over the weekend ahead of the ministry being sworn in on Tuesday.

The Australian Catholic community is welcoming news of the election of American Robert Francis Prevost as the Pope, saying it represents a momentous event in the life of the church. 

Cardinal Prevost will be known by the name Leo XIV and is the first American to be appointed to the papacy. 

Australian Catholic Bishops Conference president Archbishop Timothy Costelloe offered the Catholic church in Australia’s heartfelt congratulations. 

“Cardinal Prevost brought to his most recent role as Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops an approachability and willingness to listen which were no doubt developed throughout his many years as an Augustinian missionary in Peru,” Archbishop Costelloe said. 

“He will be warmly welcomed by the Church in Latin America, as Pope Francis was, by the Church in the United States from where he comes, from the English-speaking world as a native English speaker, and from the whole Church as a man of God steeped in the rich spirituality of his Augustinian Religious Order.”

Archbishop Costelloe said the new Pope would guide the Church with renewed hope and strength.

“Recent Popes have sought ways to be of service to the wider Christian family and we can expect that Pope Leo XIV will follow this same path. 

Catholic Social Services Australia executive director Jerry Nockles said Pope Leo’s appointment came at a critical time when the world yearned for compassionate leadership grounded in gospel values of justice, dignity and solidarity with the vulnerable. 

“At a time when Australia and indeed the world faces unprecedented social challenges – from growing inequality to escalating violence and social division – Pope Leo’s election offers a beacon of hope and a powerful reminder that the church stands firmly for peace and with those on the margins,” Dr Nockles said. 

“His voice will undoubtedly challenge us all to build a more just and peaceful society where every person’s dignity is honoured, and peace is actively pursued.”

Cardinal Mykola Bychok was the sole Australian representative at the conclave in Rome. 

Archbishop Costelloe and Sale Bishop Greg Bennet have indicated they will travel to Rome for the installation representing the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference and the church in Australia.

More online criminals are weaponising artificial intelligence to steal from Australian businesses, including using the technology to create deepfakes of employees’ voices and appearance.

Small and medium-sized businesses were at highest risk from the emerging trend, but almost all Australian organisations had encountered AI-based online attacks over the past year, a report has found.

Security firm SoSafe has released the findings in its Cybercrime Trends report, which also found Australia is one of the nations most often targeted by AI-generated attacks.

The warnings come one month after some of the nation’s biggest superannuation firms were hit with a co-ordinated online attack that saw $750,000 stolen from personal accounts.

Sydney animal vaccine firm Virbac has been regularly targeted by hackers who use AI to create realistic invoices.

Chris Mousley, a supply chain analytics specialist at the firm, said Virbac had been forced to educate staff and change its process for paying suppliers to avoid being robbed by cyber criminals.

“I get at least five to 10 of these a month and they’re extremely convincing commercial documents that look like pro-forma invoices,” Mr Mousley said.

“These are very specific documents and they’re AI-generated to look like companies we would deal with.”

The fake invoices were often for specific raw materials, he said, which indicated criminals were specifically targeting the firm and its industry.

AI software was not only being used to improve the grammar and apparent legitimacy of email scams, but to craft targeted and sophisticated attacks across different platforms, SoSafe human-centric security advocate Jacqueline Jayne said.

“We’ve had deepfakes using people’s voices to pretend to be someone on the phone and it is incredibly difficult, unless you have a code word, to be able to tell are we talking to (a colleague) or is this someone pretending to be her,” she said.

“It’s getting harder and harder to pick the difference.”

The Cybercrime Trends report, released in Friday, was prepared by research firm Censuswide and surveyed 500 IT workers across nine countries.

Despite their prevalence, only one-in-four IT workers rated their ability to detect AI-based attacks as “high”.

Most Australian organisations had experienced attacks delivered to workers’ personal devices such as phones and laptops, the report found.

Companies were also targeted by “multi-channel attacks” that used their email and social media accounts, messaging apps and voice calls.

Educating employees in how to detect deepfake scams would be vital to shutting down the attacks, particularly in small and medium-sized businesses that often did not deploy the same level of cybersecurity, Ms Jayne said.

“We’re going to see more AI-assisted and driven attacks in Australia and globally,” she told AAP.

“One way to address it is to think about what humans are doing, how they’re responding to (attacks), and how we can help them to think before they do anything.”

Companies needed to educate staff in how to scrutinise incoming communication carefully, Mr Mousley said.

This included looking for hints such as misspellings and different payment methods, and running credit checks on local firms.

“You can’t be complacent,” he said.

“We didn’t get any of these 12 months ago.”