[ADVISORY ALERT] AI Scam Is REAL!!!
AI Scam Is REAL!!! YES it is. Departing from our insightful threads, allow us to share this ADVISORY ALERT we received from numerous major newswires as to WHY AI SCAMS are indeed REAL! Yesterday, two potential AI voice scams were averted, thanks to the awareness + consciousness of the prospective victims, an executive of Microsoft and the Founder of Y Combinator. How they averted is WHAT we'd like to share in this ADVISORYπππ
Sam of Microsoft apparently was alerted by an account recovery request which he just ignored. 30 minutes later, an incoming call from a caller tagged as "GOOGLE SUPPORT". WHAT he did was to IGNORE that call again. Soon after, he received another alert from "GOOGLE SUPPORT" and this time he picked up the call [and it was a legitimate call from GOOGLE SUPPORT, asking if he travelled to Germany recently and when he said NO, he was warned that someone has been accessing his GOOGLE account from Germany the past 7 days [and even downloaded some data from his GOOGLE account], whew!@#$%?
Think about it. WHAT IF Sam picked up the earlier scam calls? God knows WHAT could have happened next. Garry Tan, the Y Combinator Founder, ended in a similar scam, having received a call fro "GOOGLE SUPPORT' claiming that they had Tan's death certificate WHEN he was very much alive. After that confirmation, Tan realized that last bit was a real scam as he noted that the ACCOUNT RECOVERY request was fraudulent❌❌❌
Now, the question is, WHAT happens if an UNKNOWN caller is displaying a number. Should you right away pick it up? NO sirrrrrrs. Let that be a missed call and the NEXT THING you need to do is 'google search' that number because if really it is indeed a legitimate one, that '1-800-NNN-NNNN' number will show that it's a number of a financial institution or any other legitimate company. And if MR GOOGLE fails to successfully search, it should alert you that someone is SPOOFING that field. You can guess WHAT happens nextπππ
Our takeaway: Much as we're all welcoming these AI technology advances, let us remain cautious IF NOT skeptical OR cynical about all these. Two days ago, we received alert that 2.5 billion GMail users were alerted for an AI hack [again with scammers pretending to be 'GOOGLE']. BUT here's a final reminder to us all. GOOGLE will NEVER as in NEVER call you except/unless you have a premium business account [which is a paid account with GOOGLE]. Even then, GOOGLE has multiple LINES OF DEFENSES. So, please be conscious that AI SCAMS ARE REAL❗❗❗