Sal

@Sal@mander.xyz

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The Terrifying A.I. Scam That Uses Your Loved One’s Voice: A couple in the U.S. got a call from relatives who were being held ransom. Their voices—like many others these days—had been cloned⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I have heard of scams like this one happening to people I know for many years now in Mexico, but without AI. In its most basic form the scammer does not need to know who they are calling, because the scam relies largely in volume and the psychology of fear.

  The victim picks up, someome screems something along the lines of ‘mom/dad please help’, and then the “kidnapper” takes the phone away and says that they have taken their daughter/son hostage and that they must not hang up the phone. They do this to several numbers until someone takes the bait and freaks out, often revealing additional information (like their kid’s name) in the process.

  With AI the scammer could spend the time and collect information to make the scam more believable. But I don’t think that the voice is the bottleneck for these scams. Those who have experienced this (including my mom, uncle, grandma, and acquaintances) say that in the moment of shock they really do believe they hear the voice of their family member.

  The AI method makes a more sophisticated class of these attacks easier to perform, but it is still a sophisticated attack that requires gathering data, and the execution will still require some form of a performance. Or… At least that’s what I think

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Thoughts on preemtively defederating from alien.top?⁩ ⁨⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Thanks, interesting discussion.

  I can see how it could be annoying if it grows to the point that mirrored posts and “user” bots dominate the feed. But I can also see the main usecase being potentially of value to some users here that may want to follow some specific reddit content.

  Since this is not an issue that requires immediate action I think it is better to wait and see. Instance blocking at the user level will become available soon, so for something benign like this I’d rather leave the decission to the users.

  I do agree that this is something to pay attention to, as something like this at scale could indeed become a problem. But I am O.K. with waiting until it does become a problem… What I have already seen many times is that theoretical future problems end up never materializing.