Published • loading... • Updated
Woman Wired $5,400 to Mexico After Scammers Used AI to Replicate Her Daughter's Voice
Scammers used AI to mimic her daughter’s voice and kept Del Mastro on the phone for about five hours, authorities said.
- In May, Martinez resident Deborah Del Mastro received a call from an unknown number claiming her 37-year-old daughter was kidnapped by a Mexican drug cartel; scammers used AI to mimic her daughter's voice, prompting Del Mastro to wire $5,400 to Mexico.
- The caller kept Del Mastro on the phone for hours while playing what she believed were her daughter's screams and cries. "It was my daughter's voice, having an absolute panic attack, scared," Del Mastro said, describing the emotional manipulation.
- When Del Mastro called her daughter directly, she learned her daughter had been at work the entire time, unharmed. Following the scam, her family now shares phone locations and avoids answering calls from unknown numbers.
- Erin West of Operation Shamrock warns that rising AI voice-cloning scams signal what she calls a growing "scamdemic." West recommends families create private code words to verify identities during emergencies.
- Dr. Peilong Li of Elizabethtown College demonstrated how easily scammers can replicate voices using only a few seconds of audio. This technological ease forces consumers to question everything they hear, according to ABC 7.
Insights by Ground AI
23 Articles
23 Articles
Local Woman Bilked Out of Thousands After Scammers Clone Daughter’s Voice With AI
An East Bay mother recently answered a call from an unknown number, which turned out to be scammers using AI and deepfake technology to sound like her daughter, whom they said had been kidnapped by a Mexican drug cartel — part of a growing trend of scams.As ABC 7 reports, Deborah Del Mastro, of Martinez, received a call in May from a man claiming her 37-year-old daughter had been kidnapped by a Mexican drug cartel after witnessing illegal activi…
Coverage Details
Total News Sources23
Leaning Left1Leaning Right0Center22Last UpdatedBias Distribution96% Center
Bias Distribution
- 96% of the sources are Center
96% Center
C 96%
Factuality
To view factuality data please Upgrade to Premium
