Tag Archives: victims

Earn Up to £800 Daily: How Fraudsters Use Phones and Texts to Deceive Victims

Posted on by
Reply

oBlue UT You will receive a call or text offering you a job opportunity. It seems enticing – it’s remote work, and you can potentially earn £800 daily. If you’re interested, just reach out to the sender through the provided WhatsApp number.

The tasks are quite simple. Typically, you’re asked to engage with TikTok content through likes and shares.

“Once you start liking and sharing, you’ll get a small payout. However, this is fraudulent funding tied to individuals involved in scams,” remarks Annya Burskys, head of fraud prevention at the National Building Association. “Then, you might be told that you need to pay a total to unlock greater profits, which could be framed as a training fee.

“Part of that money is used to compensate other victims, leading some into organized crime syndicates.”

Burskys highlights that this initial outreach is particularly enticing for many, especially students.

“We’re noticing an uptick in incidents, particularly within the 16-25 age group,” she says. “Previously, we didn’t receive such reports daily, but now we hear from individuals who have sent money or from banks alerting us about funds transferred to these accounts.”

In some instances, the victim might inadvertently become a “money mule.”

Beyond sharing funds or account details, victims may later discover that their bank and identity information have been exploited for additional fraud.

Typically, victims incur losses amounting to hundreds or thousands of pounds. “It’s far from a good deal. The concern lies in the volume,” she explains. “Events unfold swiftly. From initiation to the realization that you’ve been scammed, an investment fraud can occur over mere months or even years.”

As academic institutions close for the summer, students seeking employment should be cautious of potential scams.

What does fraud look like?




The £800 figure frequently appears in correspondence related to the scam. You will be prompted to contact via WhatsApp. Photo: Guardian

Messages often claim to originate from recruitment agencies, sometimes using legitimate company names or stating availability of work through TikTok. Some texts even reference your CV as if you’d submitted it. They promise earnings of hundreds of pounds daily (the £800 figure is a recurring theme).

Calls may bear similarities too. In a recent week, an automated voice falsely claimed to represent a recruitment agency, instructing recipients to contact via WhatsApp if interested in the job. The associated phone number typically appears as a regular UK mobile.




Some scams reference your CV as if you had submitted it. Photo: Guardian

What the message asks for

The initial message will prompt you to express interest in the position. The scammer will claim it involves work related to sharing content preferences (likely TikTok videos). When you register or when it’s time for payment, you may be asked for more personal information.

You might receive an initial “payment,” but then you will be requested to cover costs for training or to unlock access to higher earnings.

What to do

Be cautious of unsolicited messages that claim to offer job opportunities. This approach is not typical for genuine recruitment agencies. The agency asserts, “In fact, we don’t utilize our platform to directly contact job seekers for our employers to acquire new employees.”

Burskys recommends that if you receive messages from recruiters or companies offering jobs, investigate by “using the company’s home and researching on LinkedIn.” A company’s home page may provide insights into its operations, directors, and details regarding their legitimacy.

If you know the name of the employer, visit their site to see if the position is advertised.

In the UK, reports of fraudulent messages can be forwarded to 7726.

Numerous recruiters provide advice on safely conducting your job search, such as these tips.

Source: www.theguardian.com

AI, Bot Farms, and Innocent Indie Victims: The Dark Side of Music Streaming Scams

Posted on by
Reply

The music industry is currently facing a struggle, particularly regarding the operations of streaming services, with unsuspecting indie artists caught in the crossfire.

Streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple Music are inundated with AI-generated tracks, which are cheap and easy to produce. In April, Deather estimated that 20,000 fully AI-created tracks—making up 18% of new releases—were being consumed daily, nearly double the number from January. Scammers often employ bots, AI, or even humans to loop these fake songs repeatedly to generate revenue, while some exploit upload services to place counterfeit songs on legitimate artist pages, siphoning off royalties.

Spotify has begun penalizing the most egregious offenders, with the statement that it is utilizing “significant engineering resources and investigations into the detection, mitigation, and removal of artificial streaming activities.” Meanwhile, Apple Music contends that “less than 1% of all streams are manipulated.” While this might sound reassuring, the global streaming business generated $20.4 billion (according to IFPI), indicating that hundreds of millions of dollars could be lost annually to fraudulent operators.

One significant issue arises from the drastically lowered entry barriers for musicians; uploading a song to streaming platforms is now much simpler than producing CDs and vinyl. However, this ease has similarly afforded fraudsters an easier path. Though the industry has declared war on this manipulation, the automatic detection systems can mistakenly flag innocent artists, leading to their music being taken down.




Spotify’s headquarters in New York. Photo: John Nacion Imaging/Shutterstock

Darren Owen, COO of music streaming service Fuga, identified a “surge in streaming scams” spreading throughout the industry since around 2021.

Utilizing AI and machine learning, FUGA assigns a “severity score” to streaming patterns and distinguishes “nonhuman listening habits” to uncover fraudulent activities. “I wouldn’t listen to the same song on different devices at once,” Owen states. Countries like India, Vietnam, Thailand, and certain areas in Eastern Europe have been flagged as hotspots for click-farm operations utilizing low-wage labor. “It’s also been revealed that organized crime is involved,” he adds.

It’s not just platforms like Germany’s Pimpyourfollower.de, which was taken down following a court order. Similar services in Canada and Brazil are also facing scrutiny from record industry trade organizations for inflating streaming numbers artificially. Universal Music Group (UMG), the world’s largest record label, has allegedly conspired to boost play counts for Kendrick Lamar’s diss track “None Like Us.”

The Guardian has spoken with several artists who find themselves in the firing line of this manipulation war.

Darren Hemmings, managing director and musician at the music marketing company Motive Unknown, reported that a recent EP saw a track’s plays spike over 1,000—an indication of manipulation. “I don’t blame them for concluding that,” he says, but adds, “it’s very much like being judged, tried, and executed all at once.” He insists he did not manipulate his streams but couldn’t identify the cause aside from climbing popularity among real listeners.

The Northern Irish rock band Final 13 experienced their music being removed from streaming services due to a sudden spike of tens of thousands of plays. They believe this surge resulted from airplay on Radio 1, yet concluded their distributors were caught up in automated manipulation. “It’s really tough for any artist to prove they didn’t [manipulate streams], but it’s even more challenging for Spotify to justify what they did,” remarks their drummer, Doubes. “[They] take it down, and that’s the end of it.”




Matthew Whiteside at night… Photo: Julie Houden

Indie artist Adam J. Morgan, known as Naked Burner, earned over 10,000 streams in a week, likely due to his music being featured in TikTok videos, but was flagged as suspicious by distributor Routenote. “I hadn’t done anything wrong, and they offered no evidence,” he states, suspecting that it was simply due to an overly sensitive algorithm. “I spent the weekend trying to understand the problem, but Spotify informed me that my music wasn’t flagged at all.” Routenote did not respond to a request for comment.

Such takedowns can disrupt musicians, hinder marketing efforts, and ultimately affect earnings. Matthew Whiteside, who heads TNW Music Label, has faced claims of artificial streaming for three different albums. He noted that TNW Music tracks had been included in a controlled playlist. “It didn’t make sense based on genre. My distributor said I could resubmit the album for $40 each time, but that’s not feasible without assurance of success.”

“Streaming generally favors smaller acts and niche genres,” he observes. “I’d be thrilled to get 1,000 streams a month with an album.” Consequently, paying to re-upload an album can be beyond the release budget.

Deezer claims to be leading the way in implementing fraud detection mechanisms. “We monitor various metrics to help our algorithms determine user authenticity,” says Thibault Roucou, reporting director at the company’s royalties department. “When we initiate a takedown, we manually review the situation to ensure it’s a serious issue.”

Regrettably, many systems that execute takedowns often presume guilt, and the appeal processes can be so complicated that many small acts, already struggling, simply give up. Levina, who represented Germany in the Eurovision Song Contest in 2017, experienced her music being removed from streaming platforms without any warning. “Appealing against them is nearly impossible,” she sighs.




Levina is the chairman of the Artist Council in the Association of High-profile Artists. Photo: Sam Rockman

She is also the chair of the Artists Council within the Feature Artists Coalition, working to establish “minimum standards for what distributors should provide.” She suggests implementing a traffic light warning system, allowing artists the opportunity to present their defense or rectify issues.

Streaming platforms and distributors assert that the focus is on containment rather than complete removal. However, Owen notes that the current issue isn’t solely about scammers perpetrating large-scale manipulations but involves subtle adjustments to numerous tracks to avoid detection.

For Hemmings, this situation could result in a two-tier streaming landscape where smaller acts abandon mainstream platforms. “This might lead to the conclusion that focusing on alternative revenue streams is a wiser choice for many within the independent music community.”

Source: www.theguardian.com

Prosecutors urged to step up efforts to combat revenge porn and protect victims from abusers depicted in images online

Posted on by
Reply

The Crown Prosecutor’s Office is planning to update its guidance on “revenge porn” crimes to ensure that explicit photos of the victim are no longer allowed to be retained.

observer reported last month that the Magistrates’ Court did not order the removal of content related to Image-based abuse cases, and prosecutors did not request such action.

An examination of court records revealed that out of 98 cases, only three resulted in deprivation orders requiring offenders to surrender their devices and delete private photos and videos.

In one case, a man was accused by a magistrate of engaging in “deeply disturbing” behavior to emotionally intimidate the victim. Despite receiving a suspended sentence, no order was issued to have him surrender his device for deletion, leaving the police without the legal authority to do so.

These findings prompted outcry from activists, demanding immediate action and stating that the failure to act left victims “living in fear.” The CPS acknowledged the need for more action to prevent these images from being used to perpetrate further crimes.

The prosecutor’s guidance on communication crimes is currently being revised. The new guidelines, released this week, urge prosecutors to utilize deprivation orders more effectively and consistently.

Prosecutors are advised to consider implementing the order early in their case strategies to strip offenders of their devices promptly and foster a more uniform approach to device confiscation from suspects from the outset.

Campaigners welcomed the change as a positive step forward.

Elena Michael from the campaign group #notyourporn commended the guidance as a helpful step but emphasized the need for further actions to be taken.

She highlighted additional areas for improvement, such as addressing issues related to evidence collection and advocating for a more comprehensive investigation process.

Furthermore, she urged clarity on whether the guidance would extend to hard drives, cloud storage, and physical devices in addition to mobile phones.

Law professor Claire McGlyn praised the updated guidance as a positive development and a step towards progress, emphasizing the importance of addressing image-based sexual abuse cases more effectively.

The Judgment Council, responsible for issuing guidance to judges and magistrates, stated that they are monitoring the government’s new intimate image law proposal and will consider necessary adjustments to guidelines once it is enacted.

Source: www.theguardian.com

New DNA evidence from Pompeii challenges prior beliefs about ash-covered victims

Posted on by
Reply

After centuries, it has been discovered that long-standing beliefs about some of the inhabitants of Pompeii were not as accurate as previously thought.

Recent DNA analysis of human remains from the ancient Roman town destroyed by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD has shown that some victims were misidentified, challenging modern assumptions. This has shed light on how historical data is viewed in the past.

The authors of the study published in the journal Science on Thursday wrote, “We have found that traditional interpretations regarding an individual’s gender and familial connections do not align with the new evidence.” They also added, “It is not always reliable to apply modern gender norms when interpreting historical information.”

Archaeologists in Pompeii famously immortalized the victims by using plaster to recreate their bodies, leading to various stories being told about them. For example, it was believed for a long time that two women died embracing each other and a mother was found holding her child.

However, the new DNA analysis revealed that the individual thought to be the child’s mother was actually an unrelated man. Additionally, at least one of the individuals believed to be sisters or mother and daughter were actually both men.

Professor David Reich, one of the authors of the study, warned about the dangers of inventing stories about gender and family relationships in ancient societies based on present-day expectations.

The study involved researchers from the University of Florence in Italy and the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany. They used preserved genetic material to determine the gender, ancestry, and genetic relationships of the victims by examining 14 casts that had been preserved for about 2000 years.

Their findings also showed that the residents of Pompeii were diverse, with ancestral roots primarily traced back to immigrants from the Eastern Mediterranean. This underscores the multicultural nature of the city and its inhabitants.

Mount Vesuvius had been mostly inactive before the catastrophic eruption that lasted over 24 hours with devastating power. The eruption buried Pompeii, home to an estimated 20,000 people, under layers of ash, pumice, and mud, preserving the city for centuries.

Pompeii remained buried and forgotten until its rediscovery in 1748. In the 19th century, archaeologists used a technique to create casts of the victims by pouring plaster into the voids left by decomposed bodies, resulting in lifelike molds that captured the victims’ final moments.

Ongoing research on Pompeii continues to unveil new insights into the ancient city and its inhabitants. Recent discoveries, such as using artificial intelligence to decipher a charred scroll and the unveiling of a luxurious home, highlight the constant exploration of Pompeii’s history.

Source: www.nbcnews.com

Study suggests that victims of Pompeii disaster may not be accurately identified

Posted on by
Reply

New DNA analysis has shed light on the victims of the Pompeii disaster, challenging previous assumptions.

Researchers from the United States and Italy conducted a recent study that uncovered remains believed to be of family members, suggesting that the gender of some individuals may have been misidentified. Source

The study’s scientists argue that gender roles may have influenced the misconceptions about the victims of Pompeii.

“This study highlights the unreliability of narratives based on limited evidence, often reflecting the biases of researchers at the time,” explained Dr. David Carameli, co-author of the study and researcher at the University of Florence.

When Mount Vesuvius erupted in 79 AD, over 2,000 people perished, and Pompeii was buried under 3 meters of volcanic material. The city was preserved until its rediscovery in 1599.

Using plaster casts created by archaeologist Giuseppe Fiorelli in the 19th century, researchers could analyze bone fragments mixed with plaster to extract DNA information about the victims’ gender, genetic relationships, and ancestry.

It is believed that, in the absence of DNA evidence, past researchers made assumptions based purely on the physical appearance of the casts.

For instance, a family discovered in the House of the Golden Bracelet in Pompeii was re-examined. Initial assumptions about their relationships were proven wrong through DNA evidence.

Notably, experts previously misidentified a pair as sisters or mother and daughter, while genetic testing revealed one of them to be male.

The study, which examined 14 victims and was reported in the journal current biology, hopes to improve the understanding of archaeological data and ancient societies in Pompeii and beyond.

Read more:

Source: www.sciencefocus.com

Families of Texas heatstroke victims from Hurricane Beryl demand justice for unnecessary deaths

Posted on by
Reply

Two days after Hurricane Beryl struck Texas, Janet and Pamela Jarrett’s Houston home was still without power and a heat watch was in effect.

They spent the evening playing Pamela’s favorite game, Connect 4. All seemed well.

But early the next morning, Janet found Pamela, 64, who is disabled and in a wheelchair, struggling to breathe.

“I could hear her gasping for air and breathing heavily,” Janet said. “It’s something you never forget. It never goes away. I can hear it even when I’m lying down to sleep. It feels like I’m going through it all over again.”

Pamela Jarrett died on July 11 from hyperthermia due to environmental heat exposure.
Courtesy of Janet Jarrett

Pamela died on the way to the hospital on July 11. The official cause of death was: Environmental Heat Exposure.

Of the 21 confirmed deaths in Texas from Hurricane Beryl, one-third died the same way: not from typical storm threats like flooding or downed trees, but as a result of extreme heat caused by widespread power outages during and after the storm. Heat indexes, or “feels like” temperatures, rose into triple digits in the days following the storm.

These tragedies highlight how ill-prepared Texas (and much of the rest of the country) is for the increased frequency and intensity of extreme weather events caused by climate change, especially when multiple hazards overlap. The death toll also shows how easily the line can become blurred between one type of deadly environmental hazard and another.

The death toll from Beryl in Texas is expected to continue to rise, and the increase in deaths from heatstroke has led to increased scrutiny of local power company CenterPoint Energy and the state government.

“She didn’t have to die like that,” Janet said of her sister. “I’m angry that I didn’t get a response. I couldn’t call anyone. I’m angry that CenterPoint didn’t do a better job. I’m just angry about the whole thing.”

More than 2 million homes and businesses were affected by power outages caused by Category 1 Hurricane Beryl. CenterPoint said in a statement to NBC News that it would be conducting a “thorough review” of its response to the storm.

“Our condolences go out to the families and friends of those who lost their lives as a result of Hurricane Beryl,” the power company said.

CenterPoint officials insist the company mobilized crews as quickly as possible and did everything in its power to resolve the outage.

Janet Jarrett was forced to go without electricity for a total of nine days, during which indoor temperatures soared to nearly 100 degrees Fahrenheit at night. She spent a week in that heat after her sister died.

Pamela Jarrett sits with her family.
Courtesy of Janet Jarrett

Janet said she did her best to keep Pamela cool, using cold rags and taking her outside in her wheelchair when it was windy, but as with most patients with heatstroke, by the time the symptoms became apparent it was too late.

“I didn’t know there was anything really wrong with her,” Jarrett said. “She was talking, she was reacting to everything, she was just normal, so I didn’t realize anything was wrong.”

Jesus Rodriguez, 52, of Houston, also had no idea that anything was wrong with his 78-year-old father, Oscar. On July 10, the third day of the blackout, Jesus went to check on Oscar in the morning, grabbing some water and a cold diet coke from the cooler.

When Jess got home that afternoon, her dad “was lying on his back, almost like he was asleep, but he was breathing heavily,” Jess said. “I didn’t think anything of it, but I tried to wake him up, but he wouldn’t wake up. That’s when I called 911.”

Oscar died that day at Memorial Hermann Greater Heights Hospital in Houston. Jess described her father as a healthy man for his age and a devoted family man.

There have been power outages during previous storms, but never for more than two days.

“This was definitely the worst,” Jesus said. “It took almost a week and a half to get the electricity restored.”

He blamed CentrePoint for being slow to respond and for not communicating well enough.

“If they had said, ‘We can’t get to your house in a week and a half,’ I might have been able to send my father somewhere else,” Jesus said.

Three Houston-area hospitals reported a significant increase in emergency room visits due to the post-storm heat.

Dr. Ben Saldana, associate medical director at Houston Methodist Hospital, said the hospital has seen its highest number of emergency room visits since the 2021 Texas cold snap.

“On the day of the storm, our emergency department saw almost double the normal volume of patients,” Saldana said, adding, “We’re not back to normal yet.”

Doctors at the hospital said they have linked health issues in 525 patients to the effects of heat since the Fourth of July.

Even those whose lives were not in danger from the heat described the harsh conditions caused by the power outages.

Deja McClendon of Humble, Texas, was without power for six days and had been shuttling between her apartment, her boyfriend’s mother’s apartment, and a hotel to escape the heat. She said the chaos had forced her to take time off work.

“Texas is something else when it comes to the heat,” McClendon said, adding, “It was very stressful having to move around so much.”

Talulah Christie, who is five months pregnant, was without power for five days in Conroe, Texas, which is served by Entergy Texas. She said the outages after Beryl were the worst she could remember.

“I tried to endure [the heat] “After the first two days, and then the second night, I knew this was becoming a medical issue. I couldn’t stay here,” she said. But she and her husband couldn’t find an affordable hotel room nearby, so they stayed.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott has called for an investigation into CenterPoint’s response after the hurricane, but he has himself faced criticism for being on an economic development trip to Asia when the storm made landfall.

The utility has also been blamed by Democratic Rep. Sylvia Garcia of Texas, whose district saw several heatstroke deaths after Hurricane Beryl.

“The extreme heat exacerbated the public health crisis because CenterPoint failed to quickly restore power,” she said in a statement to NBC News.

Janet Jarrett said she hopes preventative measures are taken to prevent others from suffering preventable losses.

“This should never have happened. We had so many plans and they took it all away from her,” Jarrett said. “And now I’m burying her.”

Source: www.nbcnews.com

Heparin, a blood-clotting drug, may help prevent snakebite victims from limb amputations

Posted on by
Reply

The black-necked spitting cobra lives mainly in sub-Saharan Africa.

Luca Boldrini (CC BY-SA)

A commonly used blood-thinning drug could prevent hundreds of thousands of people bitten by cobras from having to have limbs amputated.

138,000 people die from snakebites each yearIt occurs mainly in sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia and Southeast Asia, and a further 400,000 people suffer complications including the death of body tissue and subsequent amputations.

Focusing on complications from cobra bites, Thien Du Researchers at the University of Sydney in Australia and their team found that the venom targets a molecule called heparan sulfate that coats the surface of cells at the site of the bite, and a natural substance called heparin produced by certain immune cells.

The researchers then exposed human skin and blood cells to the venom of two African cobra species: the red cobra (Naja Parida And the Black-necked Spitting Cobra (Naja NigricolisAdding heparin, a commonly administered blood-thinning drug, prevented the toxin from killing the cells.

Similar experiments in mice also reduced the risk of tissue death, in which heparin “was able to almost completely block localized damage at the bite site,” the researchers said. Greg Neely The same is true at the University of Sydney.

Scientists believe that while the treatment may be effective against bites from many different types of cobras, it probably won't work on other species, unless their venom uses a similar chemical pathway to destroy cells.

Unlike existing antitoxins, heparin is stable at room temperature, which could make it easier to access when quick treatment is needed, which could be done via an auto-injector such as an EpiPen, Du said.

Another advantage of heparin is that existing antitoxins cannot prevent necrosis, Du said. Jeff Isbister Researchers from the University of Newcastle in Australia say that's probably because medicine isn't always available immediately after a snakebite.

“The paper didn't compare it to antitoxin, because it's likely that antitoxin would be just as effective,” he says. The mice were given heparin immediately, which may have helped, Isbister says. “But would it have an effect an hour, four hours or more later? [the] Does it take 24 hours to get from a remote part of Tanzania to a person who has been bitten by a cobra?

topic:

Source: www.newscientist.com

Utilizing Chatbots to Combat Phone Scammers: Exposing Real Criminals and Supporting True Victims

Posted on by
Reply

A scammer calls and asks for a passcode, leaving Malcolm, an older man with a British accent, confused.

“What business are you talking about?” Malcolm asks.

Again, I received a scam call.

This time, Ibrahim, cooperative and polite with an Egyptian accent, answered the phone. “To be honest, I can’t really remember if I’ve bought anything recently,” he told the scammer. “Maybe one of my kids did,” Ibrahim continued, “but it’s not your fault, is it?”

Scammers are real, but Malcolm and Ibrahim aren’t. They’re just two of the conversational artificial intelligence bots created by Professor Dali Kaafar and his team, who founded Apate, named after the Greek goddess of deception, through his research at Macquarie University.

Apetto’s goal is to use conversational AI to eradicate phone fraud worldwide, leveraging existing systems that allow telecommunications companies to redirect calls when they identify them as coming from scammers.

Kafal was inspired to strike back at phone scammers after he told a “dad joke” to the caller in front of his two children as they enjoyed a picnic in the sun. His pointless chatter kept the scammer on the line. “The kids had a good laugh,” Kafal says. “I thought the goal was to trick them so they would waste their time and not talk to other people.

“In other words, we’re scamming the scammers.”

The next day, he called in his team from the university’s Cybersecurity Hub. He figured there had to be a better way than his dad joke approach — and something smarter than a popular existing technology: Lennybot.

Before Malcolm and Ibrahim, there was Lenny.

Lenny is a rambling, elderly Australian man who loves to chatter away. He’s a chatbot designed to poke fun at telemarketers.

Lenny’s anonymous creator posted this on Reddit. They say they created the chatbot as “a telemarketer’s worst nightmare… a lonely old man who wants to chat and is proud of his family, but can’t focus on the telemarketer’s purpose.” The act of tying up scammers is called scamming.

Apate bot to the rescue

Australian telecommunications companies have blocked almost 2 billion scam calls since December 2020.

Thanks to $720,000 in funding from the Office of National Intelligence, the “victim chatbots” could now number in the hundreds of thousands, too many to name individually. The bots are of different “ages,” speak English with different accents, and exhibit a range of emotions, personalities, and reactions; sometimes naive, sometimes skeptical, sometimes rude.

Once a carrier detects a fraudster and routes them to a system like Apate, bots go to work to keep them busy. The bots try different strategies and learn what works to keep fraudsters on the phone line longer. Through successes and failures, the machines fine-tune their patterns.

This way, they can collect information such as the length of calls, the times of day when scammers are likely to call, what information they are after, and the tactics they are using, and extract the information to detect new scams.

Kafal hopes Apate will disrupt the call fraud business model, which is often run by large, multi-billion-dollar criminal organizations. The next step will be to use the information it collects to proactively warn of scams and take action in real time.

“We’re talking about real criminals who are making our lives miserable,” Kafal said. “We’re talking about the risks to real people.”

“Sometimes people lose their life savings, have difficulty living due to debt, and sometimes suffer mental trauma. [by] shame.”

Richard Buckland, a cybercrime professor at the University of New South Wales, said techniques like Apate were different to other types of fraud, some of which were amateurish or amounted to vigilante fraud.

“Usually fraud is problematic,” he said, “but this is sophisticated.”

He says mistakes can happen when individuals go it alone.

“You can go after the wrong person,” he said. Many scams are perpetrated by people in near-slave-like conditions, “and they’re not bad people,” he said.

“[And] “Some of the fraudsters are going even further and trying to enforce the law themselves, either by hacking back or engaging with them. That’s a problem.”

But the Apate model appears to be using AI for good, as a kind of “honeypot” to lure criminals and learn from them, he says.

Buckland warns that false positives happen everywhere, so telcos need a high level of confidence that only fraudsters are directing AI bots, and that criminal organisations could use anti-fraud AI technology to train their own systems.

“The same techniques used to deceive scammers can be used to deceive people,” he says.

Scamwatch is run by the National Anti-Fraud Centre (NASC) under the auspices of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), and an ACCC spokesman said scammers often impersonate well-known organisations and use fake legitimate phone numbers.

“Criminals create a sense of urgency to encourage their targeted victims to act quickly,” the spokesperson said, “often trying to convince victims to give up personal or bank details or provide remote access to their computers.”

“Criminals may already have detailed information about their targeted victims, such as names and addresses, obtained or purchased illegally through data breaches, phishing or other scams.”

This week Scamwatch had to issue a warning about what appears to be a meth scam.

Scammers claiming to be NASC officials were calling innocent people and saying they were under investigation for allegedly engaging in fraud.

The NASC says people should hang up the phone immediately if they are contacted by a scammer. The spokesperson said the company is aware of “technology initiatives to productize fraud prevention using AI voice personas,” including Apate, and is interested in considering evaluating the platform.

Meanwhile, there is a thriving community of scammers online, and Lenny remains one of their cult heroes.

One memorable recording shows Lenny asking a caller to wait a moment. Ducks start quacking in the background. “Sorry,” Lenny says. “What were you talking about?”

“Are you near the computer?” the caller asks impatiently. “Do you have a computer? Can you come by the computer right now?”

Lenny continues until the conman loses his mind. “Shut up. Shut up. Shut up.”

“Can we wait a little longer?” Lennie asked, as the ducks began quacking again.

Source: www.theguardian.com

AI Voice Messages of Shooting Victims Call for Gun Reform in the US

Posted on by
Reply

SNine years ago today, Joaquin Oliver was murdered in the hallway outside his Florida classroom. He was one of 17 students and staff killed in America's deadliest high school shooting. On Wednesday, lawmakers in Washington, D.C., will hear his voice recreated by artificial intelligence on the phone, asking them why they haven't done more about the gun violence epidemic.

“It's been six years and you haven't done anything. You can't stop the shootings that have happened since then,” he said of the Valentine's Day 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland. A message from Oliver, who was 17 at the time of his tragic death, reads:

“I came back today because my parents used AI to recreate my voice and call you. Other victims like me have also received countless calls demanding action. How many calls will it take to care? How many dead voices will I hear before I finally hear it?”

Oliver is one of six people who lost their lives to firearms, and his voice is about to be heard again. He's issuing a call to action in an innovative online gun reform campaign launched today. shot line.

Parkland victim Joaquin Oliver

“How many dead voices will we hear before we finally hear it?”

Sorry, your browser does not support audio. However, you can download and listen here $https://uploads.guim.co.uk/2024/02/13/TheShotline_AI_JoaquinOliver_Call_to_Congress.mp3

A project by two activist groups formed in the wake of the Parkland shooting and creative communications agency MullenLowe, it leverages AI technology to generate direct messages from shooting victims themselves.

The voices are “trained” using deep machine learning from audio clips provided by family members. The resulting recordings are ready to go directly to the people in Congress who have the power to take action against gun violence. Website visitors enter their zip code and choose the message they want to send to their elected representatives.

“We all hear children's voices in our heads. Why don't lawmakers need to hear them too?” said Mike Song, whose 15-year-old son Ethan died in an accident involving a missing gun.

Ethan's message, like Oliver's, is straightforward. “Children like me die every day. It's time to act. It's time to pass laws that protect children from unsafe guns. At the end of the day, it's about helping people. It’s your job to pass responsible gun control, or we’ll find someone to do it.”

Other voices recreated for the Shotline project include that of 10-year-old Ujiyah Garcia, a victim of the 2022 Uvalde Elementary School shooting in Texas. Akira DaSilva, 23, was killed in the 2018 Waffle House shooting in Tennessee. Jaycee Webster, 20, was shot and killed by an intruder in his Maryland home in 2017. And in 2014, Mike Bohan committed suicide with a gun he could buy in 15 minutes.

Vaughn's death, who suffered from depression, sparked a movement that led to passage of Maryland's first Red Flag gun control.

Six years after Oliver's murder, it is by design that Oliver's voice is at the forefront of the campaign. One of his two groups behind this effort is march for our livean activist group formed by Stoneman Douglas students that sparked global protests after Parkland.

The Shotline campaign uses AI to generate audio messages from gun violence victims. Photo: shot line

the other one is, Change references, was founded by the teenager's parents, Manny and Patricia Oliver. They have been relentlessly advocating for gun reform since his son was murdered.

“We wanted this to be a powerful message,” Patricia Oliver said. “Joaquin has his own energy, his own image, and that's what keeps him alive. I'm so proud of Joaquin, he's the driving force that drives us forward.”

She admits the process of recreating her son's voice for 56 seconds was mentally taxing. The Olivers searched their phones and computers for videos containing Joaquin's statements and asked her sister Andrea, other relatives and girlfriend Tori to do the same.

“It was difficult to make out his exact voice because of the noise in the background,” she said. “In one video, he was in the pool and we were talking and the sound of the water was distracting.”

Eventually, we assembled enough clips for our engineers to work with, and after a long period of fine-tuning, we received the final “draft.”

“When I played it, it was incredibly shocking and a lot of different emotions came up. We had been listening to videos of Joaquín talking about the past, and now he's in a situation where he is today, very emotional. We talk about recent things,” she said.

“I know this is just a fantasy and not the truth. But in that moment, you forget what you're listening to, why you're listening, and he just says, 'Hello, Mom, how are you?' I just hope from the bottom of my heart that you just say, “?”. once again. “

Ethan's mother, Christine Song, said she felt the same painful emotions when she heard her son “talk” again six years after his death.

“It brings you back to that day, the last words your child said to you before leaving your life,” she said.

“Honestly, I just sat there and sobbed, because I knew he would never come back. But the Olivers, and my husband, and people like us all have one thing in common: What we're saying is that we go out every day and fight for respect for our children, and we're actually fighting for your children and grandchildren.”

The Songs are pressuring federal lawmakers to pass the Connecticut bill. ethan's lawrequires safe storage of firearms in the home.

“We have promised that we will not stop until we can create a cultural shift in this country where gun owners make safe storage of their weapons second nature,” said Kristen Song. Ta. “You might think that's enough because the coffins of our dead children are piling up, but when it comes to Republicans in Congress, they just don't listen.”

To create voice and calls, MullenLowe talking baby For E*Trade's Super Bowl commercial, we partnered with AI specialist Edisen, with teams in the US and Sweden working on the project.

Snippets of audio “trained” on speech patterns and tonality were fed through Eleven Labs’ generative voice AI platform, and the reconstructed voices generated voice calls from text-to-speech scripts.

“There's a lot of talk about AI right now, but this is a beautiful example of what AI can actually achieve, and a very human achievement,” says Mirko, AI creative designer at Stockholm-based Edisen.・Mr. Lempert said.

“This project was very moving and showed me how different our world is, because in my country we are not exposed to it.” [gun violence] That's the situation. That was a wake-up call. ”

Last week, the Federal Communications Commission banned robocalls using AI-generated voices after Joe Biden's voice was imitated in a fake phone call to voters in New Hampshire.

MullenLowe said Shotline calls are exempt because they are not auto-dialed, are made to a landline and are provided with a callback number.

Source: www.theguardian.com

Cybercrime: Record $1.1 billion paid in ransom by hacking victims last year

Posted on by
Reply

Ransomware gangs experienced a resurgence last year, with victims paying $1.1 billion to hackers, a record high according to a study.

Following a lull in 2022, cybercriminals intensified operations in 2023, targeting hospitals, schools, and major corporations worldwide.

Chainalysis, a cryptocurrency research firm, reported that ransom payments doubled compared to 2022, with $567 million paid out that year.

The report highlighted the “big game hunting” aspect of attacks last year, with a higher proportion of ransom payments exceeding $1 million as wealthier companies were targeted.

“2023 will be the year of a major resurgence in ransomware, with record payout amounts and a significant increase in the scope and complexity of attacks. This is a significant reversal from the decline observed in 2022,” Chainalysis said.

In a ransomware attack, hackers typically infiltrate a target’s computer system, infect it with malware, and encrypt files, rendering them inaccessible. New trends involve attackers extracting data such as staff and customer details from IT systems and demanding payment to unlock the files or delete stolen data copies.

Chainalysis attributed the decline in payments in 2022 to factors including Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Most ransomware groups are linked to Eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union, and Russia. Some fraudsters have been disrupted or turned ransomware into politically motivated cyberattacks.

The FBI disrupted the Hive ransomware group by obtaining their decryption keys and preventing victims from paying a $130 million ransom. Chainalysis also cited research showing a rise in the number of attackers and ransomware variants involved in attacks over the past year.

“The main thing we’re seeing is an astronomical increase in the number of attackers conducting ransomware attacks,” said Alan Liska, an analyst at cybersecurity firm Recorded Future.

According to Recorded Future, 538 new ransomware variants are expected in 2023, indicating the emergence of new and independent groups. The Clop group emerged as a key player last year by claiming responsibility for the hack of payroll provider Zellis, affecting customers like British Airways, Boots, and the BBC.

The British Library is still recovering from a ransomware attack by the rebranded group Rhysida that targeted the library in October.

The growth of ‘ransomware-as-a-service’, renting malware to criminals in exchange for a share of the profits, and the activity of ‘initial access brokers’ who sell vulnerabilities in potential targets’ networks to ransomware attackers have become trends.

Ellie Ludlum, a partner specializing in cybersecurity at British law firm Pinsent Masons, anticipates the rise in attacks to continue. “This increase is expected to continue in 2024, with continued focus on mass data exfiltration by threat actor groups, which may result in increased ransom payments by affected companies,” she stated.

Source: www.theguardian.com

National Amusements, owner of CBS and Paramount, alleges they were the victims of a cyber attack

Posted on by
Reply

National Amusements, the movie theater chain and parent company of media giants Paramount and CBS, acknowledged that it had experienced a data breach in which hackers stole the personal information of tens of thousands of people.

The private media conglomerate said: Legally required filings with the Maine Attorney General Hackers allegedly stole the personal information of 82,128 people in a data breach in December 2022.

Details of the December 2022 breach were finally revealed a year after the company began notifying those affected last week.

The company discovered the breach several months later, in August 2023, according to Mayne’s notice, but did not specify what personal information was stolen. The hackers also stole financial information, such as bank account numbers and credit card numbers, in combination with associated security codes, passwords and confidential information, according to a data breach notification filed in the state of Maine.

The data breach notification was submitted by the company’s human resources director, so the stolen data may relate to the company’s employees.

But the media giant has said little else about the breach or whether the personal information of its customers and users is also affected. It is not clear what type of cyberattack the company suffered, or if it received a ransom demand or subsequently paid the hackers.

National Amusement spokeswoman Rachel Luray did not respond to a request for comment Tuesday. Spokespeople for CBS and Paramount also had no comment.

National Amusements owns more than 1,500 movie theaters across the United States, but the company is best known for its control of Paramount and CBS following the Viacom-CBS merger in 2019.

Paramount disclosed another security incident in August, according to Filings with Massachusetts Attorney General, an incident in which a hacker stole the personal information of an unspecified number of customers. The hackers also stole Paramount customers’ names and dates of birth, as well as Social Security numbers and other government-issued identification numbers, according to the notice.

Disclosure: Zack Whitaker worked at CBS before August 2018.

Source: techcrunch.com