New York —
A California mom says she was scammed out of thousands of dollars this month after receiving a call that sounded like her daughter in distress. She now suspects it was an artificial intelligence-generated hoax.
She’s one of many who have been targeted by so-called “voice cloning” scams as AI tools allow anyone to create a convincing replica of someone’s voice with only a few seconds of real audio.
Americans lost more than $893 million to AI-related scams last year, including voice cloning attacks along with AI-generated phishing emails, romance scams and other hoaxes, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Scammers can mimic anyone from family members and friends to coworkers or professional services workers. Banks including the United Kingdom’s Starling and the Commonwealth Bank of Australia have warned customers to watch out for voice cloning scams.
