I
Mi casera me envió el otro día la siguiente noticia: 'Can you hear me?': New phone scam tricks you into answering 'yes'.
A new scam relies on your voice to answer a simple question: "Can you hear me now"? The scammers try to bait callers into answering "yes."
Anti-fraud agencies say that simple acknowledgment can be used to make it sound as if you signed on for a purchase or service.
"They're trying to get a recording of you saying 'yes,'" said Ron Mycholuk, a spokesman with the Better Business Bureau of Central and Northern Alberta.
"They're going to take that recorded 'yes,' play around with that audio and make it seem to you, or a representative of a business, that you have paid for some advertising, a cruise or a big ticket item, and send you the bill."
Esto es algo que ya se daba en Estados Unidos y que tiene su propia página en la Wikipiedia, que pone en hasta cierto punto que se trate de una estafa. Pero supongamos por un momento que existe un grupo criminal cuyo modelo de negocio pasa por obtener grabaciones con la voz de la víctima.
II
En agosto de este año, el Wall Street Journal informó de este robo:
Criminals used artificial intelligence-based software to impersonate a chief executive’s voice and demand a fraudulent transfer of €220,000 ($243,000) in March in what cybercrime experts described as an unusual case of artificial intelligence being used in hacking.
The CEO of a U.K.-based energy firm thought he was speaking on the phone with his boss, the chief executive of the firm’s German parent company, who asked him to send the funds to a Hungarian supplier. The caller said the request was urgent, directing the executive to pay within an hour, according to the company’s insurance firm, Euler Hermes Group SA.
III
De I y de II sacamos que a estas alturas quién necesita grabaciones, pudiendo tener sonidos generados por ordenador que no se diferencian mucho del original.