The phone rings. It’s clearly a distressed family member claiming to be in jail or in some sort of trouble and they need to wire you some funds. I will explain the details.
Most of us would do whatever we could without hesitation. This is exactly what AI scammers are looking for. Using AI to create compelling impersonations is a real thing.
That’s not all. In addition to the story of a scammer pretending to be a family in need, there are all sorts of stories where the scammer uses audio, video, and text generated by her AI to try to trick people into giving them money. can find a way. One thing they all have in common is that they are good enough to fool most people. Even the CEO of a British energy company, he wired €220,000 to someone pretending to be his German boss.
And it can happen to you too.
Usage
You may have heard the term deep fake. It’s a digitally manipulated medium designed to make you think you’re seeing or hearing someone doing something they’re not actually doing or saying. In the past, this seemed to be used mostly for pornography and election sabotage, but using “deepfake” technology to scam people is nothing new. I’m being too aggressive.
How it works is a testament to how good AI is. Using pictures, short audio samples, or pieces of text from real emails and messages, AI tricks our eyes and ears into thinking we’re watching a real video, or a real video from our boss. You can create media that makes you think you are reading an email. Even talking to family on the phone.
Sometimes there is a little tell that gives it. It can also take time to analyze media and determine that it is fake. Either way, combined with a false sense of urgency as false directives, it’s fairly easy to provoke a reaction.
Urgency is often used as a misdirection — take the time to question everything.
Consider the situation at the beginning of this article. For example, let’s say your significant other calls and desperately explains that he needs to transfer $2,500 to this account to get out of prison. They will explain all the details as soon as they get home.
Would you take the time to confirm something or question the authenticity of the call? Probably not—I know I wouldn’t. If that sounds like my wife, I’ll be the first to respond and ask questions later.
So how do we protect ourselves?
The basic rules of dos and don’ts still apply. Unfortunately, whether you’re told about an extended warranty or hear about a once-in-a-lifetime special offer on the phone with your cable company, a healthy dose of skepticism is required. If too good, it probably is.
What’s even worse is that your eyes and ears may be lying to you, so you usually have to ask someone you trust. It’s impossible to enumerate ways to protect yourself from all online-based scams other than using your smartphone as a paperweight.
What we can and should do is still mostly common sense.
- Never give passwords or verification codes of any kind to anyone who calls youIf you need to verify your identity when calling someone about a service such as a water utility, make sure you are actually talking to someone from the company.
- Stop clicking links in text messagesIn the past, the advice was to never click on links from people you don’t know, but now, no matter what you say on the phone, you can’t tell who is sending the message.
- There’s nothing more urgent than being able to stop and think for a few minutes.You have time to call before you wire bail money to someone, and the low price lock on some services never ends before you take the time to check for yourself.
- The IRS has yet to send a text warning about the audit.
- Never click links to URL shortening services — even if the sender is trustworthyPlease take the time to look up and verify the URL.I’ve seen scams pointing to things like microphonesagainsoft (versus mic)Bsoftware) for example.
- Ask them questions if you feel things may not be legalYour family and boss should be able to tell you something no one else knows. If they refuse, you refuse. You can sort out why you did it later.
It’s horrible that an article like this exists and I hated writing it word for word, but I hate the idea of criminals taking further advantage of us. No, but spending countless hours each week on the internet has made me question everything I see and hear.
I hope articles like this help you avoid scammers and are worth writing.
