AI technology is a great innovation; however, just like any innovation, it can be used for both good and bad purposes. One major issue affecting people is AI phone scams. According to a new report, back in 2022 AI phone scams wracked up a whopping $11 million in losses for US citizens.
In case you don’t know what AI phone scams are, they’re a pretty dangerous thing. Users would receive phone calls from loved ones who are in a bind and need a substantial amount of money. However, the loved one isn’t actually calling. What the receiver is hearing is an AI-generated voice. These kinds of scams have been running rampant over the past few years. As you can imagine, the generative AI explosion was a major catalyst.
In 2022, AI phone scams cost users $11 million
At this point, it’s hard to say how widespread this issue is. Scammers were able to walk away with $11 million, but there’s no telling how big the toll was in 2023. According to the FTC, there were more than 36,000 reports of AI phone scams. Of those reports, more than 5,000 people were actively scammed. Since the total amount stolen was in the millions, it’s clear that each instance saw victims scammed out of thousands of dollars.
For example, one couple sent a whopping $15,000 in crypto to help their “son.” Other victims could have possibly paid more. There’s no telling at this point.
One challenge with stopping these types of crimes is pinpointing where these scammers are located. It’s nearly impossible to reverse-engineer a call and get a location. Also, as technology gets better, it will get easier for more people to run scams, so this will further fuel the problem.
This also shows that fraud in the US has been increasing over the years. So, it’s important to be careful of phone scams. If a loved one is contacting you from an unknown number, and they’re asking you for a large sum of money, that could be a major red flag.