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With the increasing prevalence of artificial intelligence (AI) in today’s society, it is no surprise that AI is also playing a pivotal role in the landscape of modern phishing scams. Unfortunately, this is bad news for anybody other than cyber criminals. What are some of the ways that AI is making phishing scams more complex, and how can we protect ourselves?
Spear phishing with AI
AI voice and video cloning techniques
What can I do?
Spear phishing is a type of phishing scam that gathers personal information in an attempt to impersonate an individual, usually via text, email, or phone call. Scammers can now write code that enables AI to scan the Internet for resources, scraping personal information included in your emails or public websites that can later be used to impersonate you in phishing scams. One way to combat this is to use links instead of directly including contact information in your emails.
People are also starting to get phone calls from AI that has been programmed to sound like an actual person that they know, claiming that they are in danger and need help, often in the form of money. AI may even go so far as to create visual content with voice and video cloning techniques, otherwise knowns as “deepfakes.” These scams are especially dangerous because they are so convincing, and the fear tactics are effective in getting what the scammers want. If something like this happens to you, make an excuse to get off the phone as quickly as possible. Look up the contact information for that person and dial their number manually. Do NOT redial using your phone’s “Recent Calls” feature.
The FBI is encouraging individuals and businesses to stay vigilant against possible AI attacks, which will only continue to get more advanced. Whenever possible, implement multi-factor authentication as an extra layer of protection against AI-powered attacks.
You should also make sure to always use strong passwords, or passphrases (a string of words joined together to create a stronger password). Passwords should never be repeated, especially between work and personal accounts. Though it may be difficult to remember so many passwords, you can use a password manager to protect all of your passwords with a single strong passphrase and multi-factor authentication.