Con artists using AI, apps to target parents, grandparents for theft | 60 Minutes
Losses from digital theft have doubled over the past two years, according to the FBI. Sharyn Alfonsi shows how cyber scammers are using AI, apps and social engineering to target seniors.
#news #AI #scam
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Families need to develop a safe word, sentence or a safe contact procedure for all family members no matter the age
Thats a brilliant idea. Will use it with my whole family. Thank you ☺
I thought everyone had that already ???
I grew up in the 60s and 70s where you didnt need "safe words" @@ButcherBird-FW190D
Hang up and call your family member or the bank back to confirm
great idea
It shouldn't be a surprise seniors lose the most. This has been true making them THE target for years.
Now imagine the scams for when millennial get old.
@@CesarNostradamus That's nonsense! 90% of all the wealth is held by the 1% and corporations not boomers.
@@CesarNostradamusold ppl have been scammed far before boomers came about.
I remember being a kid in the 80s, and someone was trying to scam my grandmother over the telephone. It’s definitely been happening for ages, I don’t know why they said it was surprising.
I feel sorry for these victims. I have been scammed by a very sophisticated scammer. I am the last person who would fall for a scammer. After you realize it you feel shame for being so stupid and are reluctant to tell anyone. I applaud this lady to seek pubilicity.
Don't let them win by staying quiet! You are a victim.
It’s amazing what they can do. One time I got a scam call from my tiny two branch credit union- they called and spoofed the caller ID and said there were fraudulent transactions. I have the credit unions number saved in my contacts and I thought that meant it was really my credit union but it was someone likely trying to steal my identity. I reported it and now they added a warning to their voicemail and a big red banner on the APP warning people which is still there years later
Would you mind sharing the scam process you went through. I'm sure it will be educational for all of us.
Telcoms, the FCC, and Congress have been dropping the ball on spoofing for decades. The ineptitude of this country can be breathtaking sometimes.
Unfortunately because the calls are generated from outside the US the government or legal authorities don't have much pull. The FBI needs to get involved. Scammer Payback and several other scam baiters work together to get information on scammers to the proper authorities.
The first step is to just not answer the phone if you don’t know the party. You can assume any cold call is either a scam or robocall spam. It is no longer an ethical practice to make cold calls.
I just put on my phone message that if they don't leave a message, I won't call them back.
If I don't know who is calling, I don't answer. I get about ten strange calls a day. Some ask, "Can you hear me?" They are robo calls and they want your voice. But as I said, I rarely answer any more. I have a short message on my phone and they rarely say anything except "Hello? Hello?" and they hang up. Most of them have accents.
Yes! You are right. Only answer numbers you know.
Don’t even use a custom greeting. Revert to the standard computer greeting. The AI can take your recorded voice and use that as a basis for copying.
They can spoof people’s phone numbers.
The scammers are ridiculous, and there needs to be some kind of protection out there against them
it's shocking how many people fall for this.. every family needs a "safe word"
I actually was telling my elderly aunts and mother this last week!
There’s a warm place in hell for people that bamboozle the elderly.
Speaking of warm places : in the middle ages they boiled counterfeiters alive .
The one that lost 800k was the saddest part
I lost $2.1M and the sadest part is most of this sum belongs to 15 other people who gave me their funds. I have not been able to eat and rest for months. The FBI, US Secret Service and NSA don't care about Americans people being the scammed victims.
These scammers are terrible people!
My mom got this call in Seattle, WA. Kid said he was my son (her grandson) same scenario my mom said you don't sound like "__" and the kids said he had a cold. All of the grandkids called their grandparents and told them that they would NEVER call them for money. Thankfully my mom hung up on the scammer and called me. I text me son and he was at work. Talk to the elderly in your family and assure them that they should hang up and never ever give out any information.
They even try texting too😢
better still give out wrong info and make their lives harder
I'm76. It reminds me how fortunate we are not to own a home, drive 20-yr-old cars and have less than $5,000.00. Ain't got nothin',got nothin' to lose.
For any emails claiming your bank or credit card account has been charged for something, always check the account 1st thing. If there's no charged or pending charges related, assume it's a scam. If there is, call the bank or credit card company, not a number you've been texted or emailed.
Getting scammed can happen to anyone....at any age. Its not just seniors... Althought it happens to seniors too often it happens to anyone at any age. I have been scammed before. Im a young adult not ashamed to say or speak up for myself.
How they scammed you ?
I'm not yet 50 and I get a lot on reddit. I've finally gotten the google chat scam where they tell you you're such a nice person and let's chat in google chat, I can make you money, I can sell you a house, I can do your laundry, give you a root canal, etc etc etc - so pathetic. I always mess with people. If you're desperate, I get it. But I still don't have the patience for it. They get what they deserve.
If anyone ever asks you to keep quiet with family members, definitely scam and double check with family, and trusted friends! A Nigerian prince, told me "what kinda idiots send money to strangers!" 😂
It’s amazing that the older that you get the more gullible you become, just like a kid again. Things really do come full circle in a person’s life. I protect my Mother the best that I can and create a lot of stress for myself worrying about her being taken advantage of. I educate and inform her the best that I can but occasionally she does something that she shouldn’t have.
its a quote 'once an adult, twice a child"
Tech companies need to do a better job. If the scammers are this far ahead of them shame on them
N what r u gon do
@@islandhopper100 lmao
@@joaquinsstudio8880 lmao
@@islandhopper100 will ask you that question when you are in your 60s and tech goes even further than where it is now.
Our parents warned us for years about the 'dangers' of the internet while knowing nothing about it, then finally dove in and fell for every. Single. One.
I notice scams have been on the increase on every single platform, telephone, internet, mobile phone, and every single social media platform. It seems to be not much push back to stop it accept educating yourself to protect yourself from it. Unless more arrest are made I believe it is only going to get worst.
Never trust anyone who asks for money or for your personal information.
I never answer a number I don’t recognize. Never click on a link in a text or email that is unsolicited
Just answered one today apparently from the Chinese embassy but no doubt from there puppets as they hate anyone who speaks out against communism.
I been scammed but not thousands I can’t imagine how much it sucks wish people would just get a job instead of scamming people
It doesn't matter how smart you are. You HAVE to have some skepticism.
I can’t understand how they fell for any any of these. I am 83.
Well , I can . I was always in informatics but what I hear the last two years scares me . 61 years old .
Uh, I wouldn’t call it lazy. @@islandhopper100
I was not surprised to hear seniors are being scammed with AI.
How would paying a judge seem legit? That would be bribery!
They are told it is a fine. My 75 year old mom got a phone call saying she'd missed jury duty and would be arrested unless she would pay the $10,000 fine. To avoid embarrassment the bailiff could meet her, in plainclothes, on the side street of the courthouse at 4pm. My mother called me and she was frantic to get $10k in cash. She refused to believe it was a scam. Even my dad told her it was a scam. Her reasoning? Scammer verified her full name, birthdate, and address. I immediately called the courthouse. They said it was a scam and they'd been trying to catch the scammer! My mother didn't believe it until she listened in on my call. I kept telling her, would you just give $10k cash to any stranger on the street? Mom's reply, "I don't want to be arrested. Think of the shame if police come to my door. The neighbors...." My mom is a smart lady but they would have caught her if she had access to cash. Luckily Dad banks out of state and neither one use an ATM. These scammers are brutal
Basically this is a reinforcement to these scammers.
Unless we change section 230 to encourage the platforms to moderate, yup.
@@freedomishavingachoice3020should be happening TBH
😔that's just so sad. We know what's not real, but different generations who didn't grow up with this type of stuff don't know and there's no one to protect them. When I'm older I hope I learned enough to protect myself, but I doubt it. Also, how absolutely disgusting do you have to be to steal from seniors.
Scammers don't have conscious
@@worldcitizeng6507they do thy just block the tought
Where is the protection??? Where?? We are getting taken advantage of so badly, and no one to help.
Good question
I hope I don’t get a call from my imaginary grandkid.
The same exact thing happen to my bosses mother, so his father quickly called his son while scammer was still on and asked him where his grandson was at...well dad, he's right next to me in my truck! Why? Busted....
We all need to be educated. This stuff should be posted in all the news and media and make commercials out of this
Your family should always have a secret password that no-one else knows.
My phone only gets calls from my contact list. I got a call from my bank as a missed call. I check the number and it was my bank's. I had my account for about 7 years and they never called me. It's like the IRS will never call you on the phone. I checked my account and nothing was wrong. My e mail gets these messages almost everyday saying my Netflix account is being canceled because of billing info, same for Amazon or a few other accounts.
Scammers can spoof caller ID so it really looks like your bank called, but it wasn’t them.
This is why every family needs to bring back a safety code.
The fact that they told her to lie to the bank should have been a red flag. If she would have said, Let me call you back, that would have scared them off.
My daughter and cousin both work at CVS. They tell me all kinds of stories about elderly customers coming in their locations wanting to buy high dollar amount gift cards to help their grandkids. They tell them they are being scammed. Some listen, some don’t. It is TERRIBLE!! They are everywhere. I blame the US companies who outsourced jobs overseas and sold our PII decades ago. They got this train moving.
My fiancé got a call from a fake “Wells Fargo” luckily I was paying attention to his call before he gave sensitive info away.
I got that call too. Luckily, I wasn't home. No message. I called the number, and it was Wells Fargo, but they didn't call me. They can take over the number and do a line switch when you pick up. Wells Fargo said it was causing them huge problems.
Common sense and trusting your instincts go a long way.
Section 230 not allowing for liability, goes a long way for the criminals. How many internet platforms choose not to moderate because it's more profitable not to? Platforms would catch a lot of this, if they cared about our safety more than their profit.
Problem is, most people have neither.
@@Me97202 Ha ha , true ! I am one of them . Because I know they'll get me sooner or later , I threw away my smartphone . Also my sensitive information is on a separate PC without internet .
Anyone can get scammed. The best way is to learn as much as possible, to make it harder for scammers to scam you. Video like this is a good example of that.
You are correct. My phone has been hacked! Authorities did nothing to stop it!
My grandmother got scammed this way back in 2012. They told her I was in jail with a broken leg. I got a weird random phone call from her asking how my my life was going and if my leg was ok. I told her I was fine then called my mom to tell her about grandmommy getting scammed. Not sure how much they got.
I received a call like this. I told my "Grandson" he'd best start selling his Hiney in order to scrounge up the bling-bling, or just get used to being "Violated" in the lock-up.
"These victims are super sharp" "So anyway the computer popped up a message from microsoft" oof.
Family members should have a secret code word with their relatives. One that has never been used or typed online. So they can ask for it when they call. May not be a total solution but it's something... IMO. And that Aura seems hokey that it will let people on your contact list through... isn't that what spoofers do too?🤔
Spoofers take on the identity of people in your contact list. Happened to me several times.
Why not ask a trick- question or something only the grandchild would know?
I used to see this a lot on elderly people down south, when I was working for a mortgage company in the early 2000s 10:25
This is known!!! Did it not occur to grandma to check if it really was her son? Obviously, I would never give money, but at least ask questions that would prove it was really the grandchild. Then hang up, call his parents, and the police.
I get so many messages, text, emails even phone calls from scammers, and I always love to play with them and wasting their time 🤣🤣
They are recording your voice. That can be used. I won't give scammers anything especially not my voice
The young scamsters sure will rot in hell.
Thank you for this. My husband and I have multiple steps to get into financial info but now we have a secret code to verify we are speaking to each other. And we've agreed to call each other within 10 seconds (on our own phones if we get an urgent call asking for money). I'm going to set this up with our parents too.
You should have interviewed reps from ATT and Version to find out what they are doing to prevent the spoofing demonstrated. The technology has been around for a long time to prevent this with proper encryption.
In my country, banks where I keep my money impose a new policy that when anyone remit money out, there will be one day limit where money will be kept before it is remitted out. Banks know when receiving side is suspicious. In this way, banks are working to protect their account holders.
funny fact is how they get the contacts in first place, somebody is selling these contacts for sure
Keep in mind, tif you have google account and you have in your browser, Google drive, saved passwords. The moment your Gmail account is hacked, the hacker logs into your Google chrome browser and all your bookmarks are being dragged along saved passwords.
You can also report offenses to the Federal Trade Commission and the FCC. They have designated Internet Fraud divisions and the like. You don’t have to embarrassingly walk into your local police precinct, who most of the time, unfortunately, are unable to do anything about the crime. It’s like Pirillo said, they just don’t have that kind of power or influence in many of these situations.
The FBI, FCC, local police, NSA, FTC, US Secret Service don't care about scammed victims. They are there to serve the politicians, not average working class people. Trust me for telling you it's true because I am a scammed victim and I reported my case to all law enforcement agencies but no response for months already.
When the scammer calls and you talk, in a few minutes, you say, that an important call came in, (call waiting) that you got to answer, but instead you call the number on caller ID, and you might get an answering machine/voice mail.
the caller ID showing the scammer's number
How will this project you? Unless someone answers saying “Scam central how can I help you?” it’s not going to prove anything one way or another.
Almost scammed yesterday by someone claiming to be from Amazon regarding a $1500 order to be delivered to NY. I leave in FL. He was very convincing, talked to me about my accounts, etc. then transferred me to someone who said they were an officer of the FTC. Gave me a badge number and phone number. He had me until his language used turned on a red light and then sirens went off when he wanted to move my money to a Treasury account for safekeeping. At that point, I told him I had to verify who he was and he hung up. Local sheriff offered no action, but confirmed the scam. Edited to add: I did remove all payment methods from Amazon except the store card, reported one card as missing, and made sure the rest are frozen until I need to use them. The ones I use I'm on top of. mostly because I pay almost as I spend. Cards all pay cash back and I rarely carry paper money other than a few dollars in the car, just in case.
hence the word "quickly" and an certain specific "amount"
This woman actually compared losing a meager $9,000 to losing someone in your family?!?! Really you would have felt the same if your grandson had died!
If anyone tells you to stay on the line while you go get money or not to tell anyone the reason your buying something or withdrawing money, it's a definite scam. What legitimate business or legal/government entity would ask anyone to do that? Also, stop posting your entire life on line. Of course AI can imitate you if they have dozens of videos of you and can read posts of everything you've done.
What a disgrace stealing from people to destroy them cause they don't have the balls to do meaningful work with a good purpose. Is that how a person wants to be known I'm a thief a crook who is going want to have anything to do with that?
Thats ridiculous a judge will never ask you for money they award damages how stupid is this?
Dont respond to ANY ONE! Call the financial institution in question directly,if they havnt already contacted you.
just say send me a letter
Mom's (81 yrs ) phone would ring so much with potential scammers - unplugged from wall yrs. She was hit for $4K.
Regulation needs to addressed.
Report to your bank. They will collaborate with police. By reporting you help catch thieves.
we all need to arrange secret questions for each other
This sounds like almost like the case i worked where the grandad was told the same and withdrew 18k from the bank and sent by a so called courier came by and picked it up. It works because the grandparents just move into action for their grand babies instead of waiting around and telling family and friends
Capital punishment for the scammers Next story 👎🇺🇲
In 2018 someone claiming from the IRS left me a message that threatened prosecution. It sounded credible. When I called back, someone identified themselves as :Frank Wilson" and was talking about possibly charging me with something unless I paid back taxes. They dead giveaway it was a scam: Frank Wilson had an Indian accent. I questioned why for someone with a very Western name, they had that accent. They said they grew up in India. When I further asked them where they were calling from, they said they were in Germany. I was trying hard to contain my laughter during the call. It may not be very related to the video, but my story is another testament to the widespread scamming--especially from India. And most of their victims are seniors as well. Check out the videos of content creators who fight scammers: Scam Baiter, Pierogi, Scam Sandwich, Scammer Revolt, etc.
How does $399 become $14,000. Unreal someone would think that reasonable.
Probably because the scammer said they would post the "overcharge" back to his credit card or something and withdrew money from it. He was probably reimbursed by the bank though. Hard to tell.
"They're going to take me to jail!"..."Ok, you'll live...where?"
Excellent video & sharing away 🙌🏾
We need elder law a lot more than ever.
Um, i’m sorry but transnational scamming has been around for quite awhile. This news segment should have emphasized the voice cloning technology that’s being used. Nearly all of the reports of people that wound up scammed have wound up giving their money to someone local. So that means the issue is very much domestic just as much as it is out of the country - perhaps more!
Yep. It's been heavily domestic, but it's hard to admit...
this is why you teach the right path to children, old people had all the money but younger are unemployed .
My mom and dad almost got victimized by this scam.
I am a senior. I steal everything I've worked for from myself.
Learn not to ignore your IT department
I grew up with the internet but sometimes I wonder if it was ever really a good thing. I'm pretty sure I would have survived without it.
Recently I am also seeing Gen Z being targeted by these AI scams. We need to be more vigilant. Thank you to 60 Minutes for covering this!
Why doesn’t our government have a task force to fight this? Or fund some other law enforcement agency to fight this?
Everyone is a potential threat. A potential enemy. E V E R Y O N E
She looks amazing for 81
It's easy to fool a fool and even easier to fool fools!
At 12:00 it won't block the call if it's a known phone contact; yet we just saw they can spoof the number.
KNOWING IN MOST CASES IT’S EASY $ as it appears there’s little oversight Criminal negligence is minimal Wouldn’t be in the least surprised if after identifying vulnerable targets many working in these financial institutions aren’t involved Who’d have such inside information regarding their financial situations
Great reporting
In this instance the future is going to suck!
For those who post the recovery team, please consider it is already bad for people being scammed victims. Do you know how it feels for being a scammed victim? It would be 100 times worse for being re-victimized. Scammers are heartless and those who re-victimize scammed victims are sub-human, less than animals and will die horrible deaths. Please don't lure scammed victims to be re-victimized. Have heart and considerations for the scammed victims since their lives are already ruined. The scammed victims already are going through tough financial situations. Don't make it worse for the scammed victims which they might be driven to commit suicide.
I feel sad for the first one but seriously that is a staggering level of naïveté
Seniors need to become educated about electronic scams. For those of us who come from a perhaps more trusting time, it's important. I don't open any links.
We need more KitBoga’s
Scammer payback is good too as he accesses their account and deletes all their files 😂😂😂
Atp if u fall for something like this then u deserve it bc it's very obvious when ur getting scammed just think before u speak don't just listen to respond 🤦🏽♀️
All kinds of red flags 🚩. Let’s be skeptical about this criminals.
Not my son's grandma! She told them to call back!
AI vs AI. Wow. In these senior's lifetimes they've experienced multiple life altering changes in society. Technology is advancing way too fast.
Ask personal questions-that only an actual family member would know.
I was recently scammed out of $9,00 by a very talented person impersonating an employee at my bank. I am very fraud/scam savvy. The procedure they used is too long to go into here but everything they did made perfect sense.
How can you get scammed for 9k and then also claim you’re “very scam savvy?”
I dont know whether you are saying $9 $900 or $9000. So just know that you are probably not as tech savvy as you thought if you got scammed. Alarm bells are too loud for anyone who is truly accustomed to this.
Please report your experience to AARPs The Perfect Scam. It's a great podcast beneficial to everyone, not just seniors. Anybody can get scammed, just takes the right scammer.
It could happen to me too . In America alone 10 billion $ are stolen this way . I threw away my smartphone and all sensitive information is now on a separate PC without internet
It’s a pity that the scammers seem to have the upper hand nowadays. Anti-scam technology needs to catch up
Never answer text from someone you don’t know
We’re all on the conveyor belt. 🤯