Trust in hiring erodes as Greenhouse report warns of ‘AI doom loop’
NEW YORK, UNITED STATES — A new global report from hiring software firm Greenhouse reveals an “AI doom loop,” an escalating crisis of trust in the recruitment process fueled by the rapid and often opaque adoption of artificial intelligence (AI).
The Greenhouse 2025 AI in Hiring Report, shared with Fortune and surveying over 4,100 participants, details an environment where candidates and employers are increasingly pitted against each other, leading to widespread skepticism and adaptive, often deceptive, behaviors on both sides.
“Trust is at an all-time low for both job seekers and recruiters,” said Daniel Chait, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of hiring platform Greenhouse to Fortune.
Trust in AI hiring hits record low
The widespread use of AI in recruitment is eroding candidates’ trust in the system. Almost half (46%) of job seekers say they now have less confidence in hiring than they did a year ago, and 42% say this drop is directly connected to AI.
In particular, it is especially among entry-level candidates: 62% of whom were deprived of their trust. More than half (55%) of job seekers in the United States are concerned that AI is reviewing their job applications without their consent, which makes them feel helpless and alone.
This loss of trust is not a one-sided affair; the hiring managers are also facing the repercussions. An incredible 91% of hiring managers in the U.S. and 89% in Europe have caught or suspected applicants using AI to pretend to be someone they were not.
Such fraudulent tricks as fake voices or background (32%), AI programs during the interview (32%), and even deepfakes (18%) are used.
Therefore, nearly three-quarters (74%) of U.S. hiring managers are increasingly concerned about fabricated credentials than they were in 2015, a pattern of mistrust that compromises the entire hiring ecosystem.
Candidates and employers locked in tech arms race
To get around automated systems, candidates are increasingly using AI and tricks to avoid filters, leading to a growing number of job applications. Three in four candidates now use AI to job hunt, with 40% of U.S. candidates admitting to using “prompt injection” to trick applicant tracking systems.
“AI usage in first-round interviews is downright insulting and inhumane,” Paddy Lambros, CEO of Dex, an AI career agent technology company, told Fortune. “To be told it’s not worth sending a human to speak to you is a pretty poor signal.”
Furthermore, nearly half (49%) of U.S. job seekers apply to more positions specifically to get past these automated gates, a strategy that contributes to the very volume problem it seeks to overcome.
Their motivations are clear: 38% of German candidates and 26% in the United Kingdom and Ireland use AI because they feel employers use it, and they need to “level the playing field.”
Employers, in turn, are adapting to this new reality by deploying their own countermeasures and grappling with the consequences. The majority of hiring managers in the U.S. (61%) and Europe (59%) now use software to detect AI use in applications. This arms race has shifted hiring priorities: 50% of U.S. managers cite candidate authenticity as their top challenge.
In comparison, 52% in the UK are overwhelmed by the high volume of applications to review. The report indicates that over half (53%) of U.S. recruiters have handed over most screening to AI systems, yet 25% admit they are not confident in these tools, and 8% do not even know what their AI prioritizes, highlighting a lack of control in the very systems meant to create efficiency.
“I think that that’s really the future of hiring. It’s less about pipelines, and it’s more about highly accurate matchmaking,” Lambros noted.
This cycle of AI-driven deception and detection not only threatens to make human judgment a casualty of the hiring process but also signals a future where the foundational trust required for a functional labor market is systematically eroded.
