Allow the caller to speak first if you answer a call from an unknown number. It’s possible that the person on the other end of the line is secretly capturing clips of your voice in order to impersonate you later on in a convincing way.
The Federal Trade Commission warns customers to be wary of con artists who secretly record people’s voices in order to later pose as them and request money from victims’ relatives.
In light of the advent of AI-powered products like ChatGPT and Microsoft’s Vall-E, a text-to-speech converter tool the firm unveiled in January, the FTC highlighted such a scenario. Vall-E is not yet accessible to the general public, but Resemble AI and ElevenLabs, among other businesses, produce technologies that are. With the aid of this technology, written sentences may be accurately translated into convincing audio using a little sample of anyone’s voice.
“Your phone rings. An anxious voice may be heard over the phone. Your grandson is here. He claims that because he crashed the automobile and was arrested, he is in serious difficulty. But you may contribute by contributing cash. You inhale deeply and contemplate. You are aware of grandparent fraud. Darn, though, that sounds exactly like him “Alvaro Puig, a consumer education specialist at the FTC, posted a message online.
You only need three seconds
According to experts, criminals are using easily accessible “voice cloning” techniques to trick victims into thinking that their loved ones are in crisis and urgently need money. All it takes is a brief audio clip of someone’s voice, which is occasionally accessible online, and a voice-cloning app like ElevenLabs’ AI speech software, VoiceLab. If it isn’t, it may be obtained by recording a spam call.
According to Hany Farid, a professor of digital forensics at the University of California, Berkeley, if you created a TikTok video with your voice in it, that would be sufficient, CBS MoneyWatch said. For instance, a voice mailbox recording might be sufficient.
He is not shocked by the prevalence of such frauds. Continuum, this is a part of it. Spam calls came first, followed by phishing emails and text messaging frauds. So, this is the scams’ logical progression, according to Farid.
Don’t believe what you hear
In real life, this implies that you can no longer trust voices that sound exactly like those of your friends and family, according to the FTC.
The FTC cautions, Don’t believe what you hear. Make touch with the alleged contactor to confirm the information. Use a phone number that is known to belong to them. Try contacting your loved one through a different family member or one of their acquaintances if you are unable to reach them directly.
The creator of Vall-E Microsoft made a reference to this issue by saying that the model “may contain potential risks in misuse, such as spoofing voice identification or impersonating a certain speaker” in a paper showing the technique. According to the report, the tool “should contain a mechanism to confirm that the speaker allows the use of their voice” if it is made available to the general public.
ElevenLabs stated on Twitter in January that it also witness a rising amount of voice cloning misuse situations.
The company claimed that identity verification is necessary to screen out dangerous content because of this and that the technology will only be made available for a price.
How to keep oneself safe
It’s crucial to be on the lookout for criminals who use voice cloning software to impersonate other people and conduct crimes. First of all, if you answer a call from an unknown number, let the caller speak first. If you express yourself as “Hello? What individual is this? “They might mimic you using that audio clip.
Farid claimed that he now only answers the phone when he is anticipating a call. And when he gets calls from supposedly related people, like his wife, that seem “odd,” he asks her for a code word that they have set.
Now, if we think someone else knows it, we may even pronounce it incorrectly, he told CBS MoneyWatch. “It’s similar to a password that you keep to yourself. As long as you have the resources to ask and don’t panic, there is a really simple solution around this.
It is a low-tech solution to a high-tech problem. The FTC also cautions consumers not to believe incoming calls from unknown persons and suggests that people check calls purporting to be from friends or family members in another way, such as by phoning the person on a known number or contacting common connections.
Also, it can be a warning sign when someone requests payment via gift card, money wire, or cryptocurrency.
According to the FTC, scammers persuade victims to wire or pay money in ways that make it difficult to get their money back.
