AI is becoming more and more familiar to us through voice recognition apps, chatbots, AI home appliances, etc. However, as the technology advances, concerns about its misuse also increase.
Who are you talking to?One such case is fraud using AI-generated voice messages, with a recently published survey finding that more than one in four people in the UK have already been the target of a scam.
AI voice generation can create a voice that sounds exactly like a person’s voice if there is only a short audio file of just a few seconds. Criminals exploit this by creating a voice that resembles a person’s voice from videos or voicemails uploaded to the Internet, such as on social media. They then identify the address of that person or their family, call them, or send them a voice message, demanding money, citing compensation for an accident or rent payment.
A survey of 3,000 people conducted by the UK’s Starling Bank found that 28% of respondents had been the target of an AI voice-generated scam at least once in the past year.
Another study revealed that the average UK adult has been the target of a scam five times in the past year.
How to avoid AI voice scams
How can you avoid falling prey to sophisticated fraud schemes that use AI voice generation? Starling Bank suggests that you create a common password or secret phrase for your family.
When someone calling you and claiming to be a family member or friend asks for money, you can find out their password or secret phrase to verify that they are really a family member or friend.
Also, since voices created by AI may speak like a robot or have unnatural pauses, it would be good to be able to detect such anomalies immediately.
It would also be a good idea to be aware that videos of you and your family that you upload to social media every day could be used for AI voice scams.
[Main reference articles]
This is Money. Millions could be caught out by little-known AI voice imitation scam – and one major bank warns 28% of Britons have already been targeted. September 18 2024
