Don’t fall for the latest AI scams: Here’s what to know

From science fiction wonder to reality, AI is all the rage, with countless powerful AI tools becoming widely available for public use. It can be wildly helpful, whether you need help writing an important email, a workout routine, or even a last-minute dinner recipe. Unfortunately, AI has also helped scammers step up their game, in some cases to scary-good levels. 

Today, Spokeo takes a look at what exactly AI scams are, including what they look like and how to spot them. 

Key Takeaways: 

• AI technology is empowering scammers to run even more convincing scams.
• Watch out for scams that use voices and/or faces you recognize.
• Social media is a hotbed of AI-powered accounts and influencers. Beware of any messages you receive or posts you see that request private information or money.
• Look for common signs of AI, including “the uncanny valley,” abnormalities in a video or photo, and odd speech patterns that are overly repetitive and vague.

What Are AI Scams?

Let’s start from the very top. AI scams use artificial intelligence tools to create sophisticated and often personalized content to effectively target and trick victims. AI is capable of allowing scammers to copy voices and faces, making it almost impossible to tell if a phone call or video is actually the person you’re hearing or seeing. It is scary stuff — especially if you don’t know how to spot it.

Beyond impersonation scams, AI also allows scammers to take a mass approach to email and text scams. Classically, scammers needed to actively interact with victims who emailed or texted them back in order to move the scam along. Now, with a properly trained AI, scammers have technology that can do all of the interacting on their behalf, and do so on a much bigger scale (essentially creating a little army of AI scammers). 

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. With AI rapidly improving, there’s a 100% chance that AI-related scams will improve with it. But, for now, let’s look at some of the most current AI scams.

Common AI Scams

Here’s how scammers are using AI to trick their victims.

AI Voice Scams

Imagine this: You get a call from a loved one, explaining an emergency situation that they need your help with — what do you do? Classically, you probably jump into action, no questions asked. After all, you just talked to them on the phone. Now, you might need to take a beat to sus out if that call was real, or if it was using AI voice cloning. 

AI voice scams operate by either cloning a loved one’s voice or even a recognizable authority figure. They will then call you using the cloned voice, and present a situation that requires urgent action — usually in the form of sending money.

How to stay safe: Hearing someone you care about in need can be hard, but in today’s world, there are a few steps you need to take before jumping in.

• While scammers purposefully create situations in which you can’t ask questions, try to extract any information you can that would potentially confirm the identity of the person behind the call actually matches the voice.
• Scammers won’t be calling from a number you recognize (unless they’re number cloning or spoofing, as well). Quickly reach out to the person who you think just contacted you by calling or texting their actual number. You can also run a reverse phone lookup to investigate who’s really behind an unknown number.
• Consider if the request makes sense. For example, if the person calling you needs cash, any requests for cryptocurrency, gift cards, or wire transfers are big signs that it might be a scam.

Deepfake Scams  

Catfishing — presenting pictures of other people as if they were them in order to trick victims into relationships they could extort — has long been a scammer’s go-to. While catfishing is still a problem, a lot of people have wised up to the fact that, unless you actually talk to a person face-to-face, you can’t trust just photos.

Enter deepfakes. Deepfake scams utilize AI technology to generate convincing photos and videos (including live video deepfakes). Scammers are using this technology to revolutionize catfishing by sending personalized videos or even video-calling victims with deepfaked faces. This can range from a totally made-up face, a clone of a random person’s face, or even the use of a celebrity’s face.

How to stay safe: Although widespread use of deepfakes for scamming isn’t pervasive (yet), the door is open for increasingly tricky scams. Here are some tips that might be able to help:

• Trust your gut. It sounds like vague advice, but if you’ve ever heard of the uncanny valley (an unsettling feeling people get in response to something that appears human, but isn’t), your gut feeling might be onto something.
• Look for irregularities. AI is pretty convincing, but sometimes it doesn’t get everything right consistently. Look for moving marks (like freckles or moles), weird shadows or glares that come and go, and odd movements around the mouth and eyes.
• Unfortunately, deepfakes can be pretty hard to detect without certain tools, which means you can really only trust what and who you see in real life. So, with that in mind, never send money to someone you’ve never actually met, especially when it comes to people you’ve met online. 

AI On Social Media 

Getting famous on social media used to take a blend of talent, luck, and some of those special intangibles that a few people seem to be born with. Now, all of those things can be carefully crafted into fully created AI influencers. AI influencers are social media profiles that gain a large following, often based on how they look and the message they present. The problem is, they’re completely fake (it’s often hard to tell), and are created and run by shady figures. They can use their platform and following to ask for donations, sell merch, or any other scheme to trick people into sending money.

In addition to AI influencers, you may come across AI bot accounts that can make posts, comments, and even send DMs that mimic genuine users on your feed. This is pretty akin to catfishing, except with an army of AI-driven bots instead of a single scammer doing all the legwork. 

How to stay safe: Social media used to be a way to share what you’re up to with people you know. Now, it’s a hub for all kinds of social interactions — plenty of people have actually met good friends or partners through social media. But social media has become a hunting ground for scammers. Here are some tips to spot AI on social media: 

• Back to the uncanny valley; if the content you see, whether it be videos or photos, seems off or just too perfect, you’re probably looking at AI.
• Look for misspellings or things that don’t belong. AI images will often have some little tells, like weirdly spelled words, extra fingers, or limbs appearing out of nowhere.
• Pay attention to repetitive and vague answers. AI is getting better at conversations, but it still often says the same meaningless things with slight variations.
• Making a new connection online can be great, but don’t send out any money or private information.

AI Fraud Emails and Texts

If you have a cell phone and email address, you’re already familiar with all sorts of fraudulent texts and emails. Most commonly, these messages are part of a phishing scam, where scammers send you important or urgent-looking messages that try to get you to click on a malicious link that leads you to unknowingly give up sensitive private information. 

By now, scam filters have gotten pretty good at detecting these phishing emails and texts, mostly because they are all almost identical. With AI, however, these texts are starting to appear much more realistic in that they are more personalized and interactive. This not only helps them get by spam filters but also successfully tricks victims.

How to stay safe: Most of the things that help you stay safe from regular phishing scams still apply to AI scams, but here’s what to watch for:

• Look for repetitive and vague answers whenever you ask a question.
• Don’t click on random links. This is sort of the golden rule of staying safe from scams — unless you’re 100% sure a link is safe, don’t click on it. If you think it might be legit, navigate to the supposed sender’s real website on your own and go from there.
• Run a reverse lookup search to see if the details match up. These tools let you search phone numbers, addresses, names, and emails, and provide information on who’s behind them.

FAQ

How do you spot an AI scam? 

Look for common signs of AI scams, such as irregularities, overly perfect images, or odd speech patterns that are often repetitive and vague. If a scammer is using voice and/or face cloning AI technology to impersonate someone you know, try to ask questions to verify their identity. Alternatively, look up the name or number they give, using a reverse search tool.

How do I protect myself from AI?

Approach anything you see or hear online or on your phone with a certain level of skepticism. As AI grows, it may become more difficult to tell what’s real and what’s fake. To protect yourself, don’t give up sensitive private information online, through text or email, or via a link you’ve received. Also, beware of extra-convincing catfishing attempts, and never send money to someone you haven’t met in real life. 

What are some ways to check if a message is from a scammer?

If you receive a message that has a sense of urgency and is requesting action on your part, that’s your first sign. Also, look out for messages containing links, requests for private information, and requests for payments. If you notice the “person” you’re messaging keeps saying the same things and ineffectively answering your questions, there’s also a good chance you’re talking with an AI-powered bot.

This story was produced by Spokeo and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.