A screenshot of “Daisy” generated by AI. It’s a new program launched by British telephone company O2 to combat phone fraud. Screenshot captured by NPR/O2 Hide caption
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Screenshot captured by NPR/O2
British mobile phone company O2 has announced a new product called Daisy, a chatty, kitten-loving artificial intelligence “grandma” who talks to scammers to keep them away from real humans.
“Hello, scammers. I’m your worst nightmare,” Daisy says by way of introduction to the would-be failures.
A video introduction featuring former Love Island contestant and scam victim Amy Hart shows how the scammers, just as Daisy glibly talks about her kitten Fluffy and her inability to follow scammers’ instructions. I can hear the same frustration as the victims. .
“I think your profession is causing trouble for people, right?” one of the defeated con artists tells Daisy after being allowed to escape.
“It’s been almost an hour! For the love of my life (bleep)” another exclaimed in frustration.
But for Daisy, time wasn’t really a concern.
“They can’t fool you while they’re busy talking to me. And, let’s be honest, I have a lot of time,” she says.
O2, the company behind Scam Grandma, said its AI technology allows scammers to stay on the phone for 40 minutes at a time. Daisy was trained with the help of YouTuber and software engineer Jim Browning. Jim Browning has made a career of exposing scammers online to his community of 4.4 million subscribers.
To lure scammers into time-wasting calls, the company used a technique called “number seeding,” where the AI grandma’s number was placed on a list used by scammers to find victims. The purpose of this grandma contraption is two-fold. One is to keep scammers away from real people, and the other is to raise awareness of the dangers of dangerous phone scams.
Murray McKenzie, the company’s director of fraud, said: “We’re investing in everything from firewall technology to block fraudulent emails to AI-powered spam call detection to keep our customers safe and do our part to stop fraudsters. I am working hard to accomplish this.” statement.
“But importantly, Daisy is a reminder that no matter how convincing the person on the other end of the phone is, they aren’t always who you think they are.”
