{"id":3207,"date":"2024-02-09T05:45:33","date_gmt":"2024-02-09T05:45:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/?p=3207"},"modified":"2024-02-09T10:20:18","modified_gmt":"2024-02-09T10:20:18","slug":"fraudsters-leverage-artificial-intelligence-and-social-media-to-prey-on-holiday-shoppers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/information\/fraudsters-leverage-artificial-intelligence-and-social-media-to-prey-on-holiday-shoppers\/","title":{"rendered":"Fraudsters leverage artificial intelligence and social media to prey on holiday shoppers."},"content":{"rendered":"
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In New York, as holiday shopping kicks off, scams surge too, with fraudsters employing novel tactics to swindle money from unsuspecting victims. An 85-year-old gentleman, who fell prey to a $19,000 scam, emphasized the importance of speaking via a Suffolk County Police landline to us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It’s astounding how convincingly real they sounded,” he remarked. “Being caught up in something like this is emotionally devastating. You don’t even realize it.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Investigators revealed that scammers utilized artificial intelligence to replicate his granddaughter’s voice, claiming she was arrested and needed bail money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A man in an SUV arrived at his Hauppauge residence to collect the cash.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, police and consumer watchdogs say they’re concerned those same tactics could be used to trick holiday shopper – and that’s not the only ruse they’re concerned about.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Now they’re going into, say, social media posts, whether it be Facebook, TikTok, wherever you can post a video of yourself. They get that voice of that granddaughter and now that target is hearing from that voice,” said Suffolk County Police Det. Lt. Michael Sanchez. “Even when you hear that person that you think is granddaughter, family member, take that breath. Think about what you’re going to do next.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A new report from the Better Business Bureau cites a 50% increase in reported gift card scams over the last year. That’s when someone tries to get you to buy a gift card and then they ask you to read or text them the card’s number so they can cash in on the funds. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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  • Caught in a gift card scam? Here’s how to get your money back<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

    “It can be a simple purchase online where somebody is asking you to buy a service or an item using a gift card,” said Claire Rosenzweig, CEO of the Better Business Bureau of Metropolitan New York.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Here are some tips from the Better Business Bureau to better protect yourself:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    • Never trust anyone who asks you to buy a gift card to pay for something.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • When you do buy something, use a credit card if you can because it can protect against fraud better than a debit card. <\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • Be on the lookout for phishing scams, like phony emails from companies claiming to be Amazon or other familiar ones. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

      “All kinds of expenses are gonna be increasing and scammers are gonna be looking for those opportunities,” said Rosenzweig. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

      Of course, emerging technologies can be used in a variety of scams. To demonstrate the dangers, a cybersecurity expert re-created the voice of CBS News correspondent Carter Evans using his reports. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

      It’s something people all over the world are learning about. Some are learning the hard way. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      In New York, as holiday shopping kicks off, scams surge too, with fraudsters employing novel tactics to swindle money from unsuspecting victims. An 85-year-old gentleman, who fell prey to a $19,000 scam, emphasized the importance of speaking via a Suffolk County Police landline to us. “It’s astounding how convincingly real they sounded,” he remarked. “Being […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3235,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3207","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-information"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3207","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3207"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3207\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3236,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3207\/revisions\/3236"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3207"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3207"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3207"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}