On Thursday, the FBI issued a stern warning regarding a new tactic employed by cybercriminals who are impersonating high-ranking U.S. officials through artificial intelligence-generated voice messages. These scams specifically target both current and former government officials, as well as their contacts.
In an official announcement, the FBI advised individuals to be cautious, stating, “If you receive a message claiming to be from a senior US official, do not assume it is authentic.”
The agency revealed that since last month, scammers have utilized methods referred to as smishing (sending fraudulent text messages) and vishing (voice phishing) to create a false sense of trust as they attempt to gain access to personal accounts.
These deceptive communications often include links to malicious websites under the guise of transitioning conversations to a different messaging platform, enabling the perpetrators to compromise accounts of U.S. officials.
Once they access these accounts, the criminals can target additional officials or associates using the stolen information, as noted in the announcement.
The FBI also highlighted that the contact information obtained via these social engineering tactics might be used to impersonate others in an effort to extract further sensitive information or financial resources.
While the FBI did not disclose which officials have been impersonated, it detailed that numerous victims of this plot are “current or former senior US federal or state government officials and their contacts.”
Requests for further information regarding the scale and origins of this vishing scam have yet to receive a response from the FBI.
This is not the first time the FBI has cautioned the public about the risks associated with generative AI. Previous warnings highlighted the technology’s potential to facilitate large-scale financial fraud schemes.
Criminals can leverage various forms of generative AI to produce text, images, audio, and video to mislead potential victims into transferring money or falling victim to sextortion tactics.
According to the FBI’s annual data, the top three cybercrimes identified in 2024 were phishing, extortion, and personal data breaches.
The data indicates that older individuals were disproportionately affected, suffering nearly $5 billion in losses.
