AI ‘voice cloning’ scams are on the rise. Here’s how to protect yourself – The Mercury News
AI ‘voice cloning’ scams are on the rise. Here’s how to protect yourself – The Mercury News
Publish Date: 2026-05-29 10:16:00
Source Domain: www.mercurynews.com
By Clare Duffy, CNN
New York — A an East Bay mom says she was scammed out of thousands of dollars this month after receiving a call that sounded like her daughter in distress. She now suspects it was an artificial intelligence-generated hoax.
She’s one of many who have been targeted by so-called “voice cloning” scams as AI tools allow anyone to create a convincing replica of someone’s voice with only a few seconds of real audio.
Americans lost more than $893 million to AI-related scams last year, including voice cloning attacks along with AI-generated phishing emails, romance scams and other hoaxes, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Scammers can mimic anyone from family members and friends to coworkers or professional services workers. Banks including the United Kingdom’s Starling and the Commonwealth Bank of Australia have warned customers to watch out for voice cloning scams.
Experts say AI voice replicas have gotten so realistic that most people can no longer reliably distinguish them from real human voices.
“For the everyday person, it is just not fair to expect them to be able to spot this stuff,” said Henry Ajder, an expert on AI-generated media who consults for governments and companies. “I struggle with it. Most people do.”
How do AI voice scams work?
Scammers can create an AI replica of someone’s voice using a short recording of their speech — often pulled from social media or an earlier scam call that was surreptitiously recorded. Social media can also provide a trove of information about family members and close friends who could be targeted.
Fraudsters will typically make it sound like the loved one they’re mimicking is in distress, purportedly having been kidnapped or in jail. Then they’ll urgently demand money in exchange for their loved one’s release.
“There was no time to think,” Gary Schildhorn, a Philadelphia attorney who was targeted by an AI voice scam mimicking his son, told CNN last…
