Someone sent me the ai version of me. Then, I got successfully phished by someone impersonating, a friend.
Imagine not being able to discern the difference between someone you’ve know for forty years, and AI. AI that can copy speech patterns, yes?
I posted this on twitter as a cautionary tale:
“Well, hell. I just got phished for a $400 gift card, by someone impersonating my best friend. Miraculously, I was able to cancel the transaction. Be careful!!”
I said I was able to cancel the transaction, but that is irrelevant. I got swamped with messages like these… you can click to enlarge.
and these
So what I’ve really done is advertised, I’m an idiot!
My friend got dementia – I did some searching and what followed was astonishing. Floods of scammers looking to take advantage of someone who is impaired. Emails, snail mail, phone calls and texts!
I’m lucky in that I have done consultations with a great many people who post here, so I know for sure they are real. This was not the case, before I stopped political discussions (which brings out the bots and shills, in droves).
There was a time you could find your new best friend online, but with the regular people replaced all over the net, the little groups of friends you break into, are likely false, They’re on the job, so to speak.
Personally, I am unable to find any real, regular people on social media, anymore. NONE. Just fake hive mind groups, posting to entice me/you into their sticky little psy-op. It’s like falling into a tar-pit. You get all gummed up; it’s hard to exit. Once you get out, odds are you’re wrapped in something similar… by the end of the day?
I’ll take this even further… the entity that impersonated my friend, continues to email me, claiming to be real. Can I say, 100%, this is not my friend? NO.
I know this is odd and hard to believe but I am trying to communicate the level of sophistication here, on top of the level of overall confusion in the air. Put it this way. If someone emails you from [email protected] and sounds just like me, you’re going to assume it’s me. Later, if you get a wonky feelings, you may be tricked, you may end the communication.
But then, I or the fake I, email you, “Where did you go”?
Do you know who you’re talking to? This is the situation I’m in. I cannot be 100% sure I am not mistaking my friend for a grifter!
I could see this being the end of email, though everything else can be faked, too! Especially because most of what we see is altered and has been all our lives.
We already don’t know what we’re looking at, but it’s getting very personal at this point and we have everything to lose.
Your ideas??
Elsa, scammers are everywhere. Very true that scammers take advantage of the disabled. I had cataract surgery and was advised the anaesthesiologists’ company was hacked. Besides, the usual emails and texts, they sent me paperwork in the mail. It was legit enough b/c my eyes were adjusting. I put it aside, however, as my instincts were triggered. I received the correct paperwork from my city/county and few weeks later. I called the USPS mail fraud line. At this point, I’ve frozen my credit at 3 credit bureaus, locked my sim, signed up for my e-verify, and changed all passwors. I deal with clients all over the U.S. and Canada, and so many tell me they’ve have been hacked for cash, securities, etc.
New kind of verification … I still don’t know how to talk to my mom about it. I think she’d be one to fall for it.
We all had to learn how to avoid other phishing scams … these are more skills we have to learn, fast.
I guess the first step is to separately contact the person who’s ostensibly contacting us for “help”?
The AI voices thing … hard for me to fathom.
We’re all being isolated because we can’t trust the information coming in.
What’s crazy, is just a week ago, I posted in the forum about reading retail workers, talking about old people coming in to buy (razor gold) gift cards, *constantly. They try to tell the people they are being scammed, but they don’t believe it, so they sell the cards… or some have removed them from the store.
FF five days and I fell for this. I really have no excuse. I mean, I was distracted and it was someone I trust, implicitly, someone I would do virtually anything for. Plenty of Neptune around, but still?!
It’s miraculous I got my money back. I felt the least I could do is write this, and hopefully spare someone.
We’re going into high season of this… also, we have a landline, but I NEVER pick it up unless I know the person / caller id. The first time I met a gal who told me she did this, I thought it was nutty. But now I am in an age group that gets targeted. I see the sense.
Good point on the isolation. It reminds me of how people self-censor.
Elsa, besides Neptune everyone is multitasking. I was hit by the National Public Data breach, too. My friend was hit by the United Healthcare data breach. Please note, my young coworker was hit by ATT data breach. My I.T. Dept. has 18 character passwords. Diligence is important, let’s not despair. Let’s learn new ways to protect ourselves.