Advances in AI-generated deepfake audio could spell a boom in phone call fraud.
Several wealthy Italian businessmen received a surprising phone call earlier this year. The speaker, who sounded just like Defence Minister Guido Crosetto, had a special request: Please send money to help us free kidnapped Italian journalists in the Middle East.
But it was not Crosetto at the end of the line. He learned about the call only when several of the targeted businessmen contacted him about it. It eventually transpired that fraudsters had used artificial intelligence (AI) to fake Crosetto’s voice.
Advances in AI technology mean it is now possible to generate ultrarealistic voiceovers and soundbites. Indeed, new research has found that AI-generated voices are now indistinguishable from real human voices. In this explainer, we unpack what the implications of this could be.
What happened in the Crosetto case?
Several Italian entrepreneurs and businessmen received calls at the start of February, one month after Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni had secured the release of Italian journalist Cecilia Sala, who had been imprisoned in Iran.
In the calls, the “deepfake” voice of Crosetto asked the businessmen to wire approximately 1 million euros ($1.17m) to an overseas bank account, the details of which were provided during the call or in other calls purporting to be from members of Crosetto’s staff.
On February 6, Crosetto posted on X, saying he had received a call on February 4 from “a friend, a prominent entrepreneur”. That friend asked Crosetto if his office had called to ask for his mobile number. Crosetto said it had not. “I tell him it was absurd, as I already had it, and that it was impossible,” he wrote in his X post.
By Sarah Shamim