AI software and voice cloners simulate distracted saps willing to stay on the phone forever—or until callers finally give up

  • alejandro@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    28
    ·
    1 year ago

    Soon, call scams will figure out how to use their own LLMs to run the scams, and we’ll just have robots talking to robots.

    What a time to be alive

    • 2dollarsim@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      5
      ·
      1 year ago

      It gets worse. Now we have people writing summaries for AI to write articles and then people using AI to summarize the articles again.

    • Greenskye@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      5
      ·
      1 year ago

      Most of my spam is already robots. But I can see the call network going down because all calls are now just robots talking to robots with no exit loop. Would be the final nail in the coffin for voice calls for me.

  • Craynak_Zero@kbin.social
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    19
    ·
    1 year ago

    I hope this causes the entire telemarketing industry to collapse forever. The fact that companies have been allowed to do this for so long goes to show how absolutely corrupt the US government is.

  • zeppo@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    17
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    Ha. We used to manually make crank calls with the voice generation program on the Amiga in 1989. The best was when we for some reason called this lady and told her something about Satan, and I swear she told us “Satan isn’t worth a basket of fruit!!”. So we started calling people and saying in the robot voice “Saaatan isn’t wooorth a baassket of frrru-iit”

  • jcit878@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    16
    ·
    1 year ago

    sounds like a good idea. they use bots on us why not return the favour. i managed to annoy (an actual bot) so much the other day because i refused to answer one of its preset answers

  • justhach@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    11
    ·
    1 year ago

    The potential for AI cloning of voices has made me change up my method of time wasting phone scammers.

    Now I put on a funny (yet believeable) voice when I talk to them so they can’t use me as part of their scams in the future.

    Maybe I am being overly cautious, maybe I just like a chance to practice my funny voices, but as long as I waste these guys’ time thats one other person who dont get called.

    • nobodyspecial@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      5
      ·
      1 year ago

      I thought I was the only one to answer unknown calls using my best Barney Gumble impression (which is really, really good I’ve been told). If it’s a legit call I can pretend I was choked up due to allergies. If not, the telemarketer can continue to enjoy talking with Springfield’s best known alcoholic.

      • demonsword@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 year ago

        ReplayWeb.page could not be loaded due to the following error: SecurityError: The operation is insecure.

          • kamenLady.@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            7
            ·
            1 year ago

            “Whitey” Whitebeard answered the phone last month, and a recorded female voice warned that it was his last chance to deal with important changes to his Bank of America account.

            “Hello. Talk to me,” Whitebeard said in the gruff voice of an annoyed senior. Within seconds, the call was transferred to Kevin, a real person. “Thank you for calling card services,” Kevin said. “How are you doing today?”

            “Huh,” Whitebeard answered, now sounding a little befuddled.

            ‘Hello? Hello?’ “What do you think, how much owed on your credit cards, collectively,” Kevin asked.

            Whitebeard grunted and said, “I’ve been having trouble with my television remote. Can you help me figure out how to change the channel to watch my favorite show?”

            Whitebeard has a bad habit of talking in circles. That is by design. Whitebeard is a digital contraption that only sounds human. He is the creation of Roger Anderson, a real-life 54-year-old in Monrovia, Calif., who employs chatbots and AI to frustrate and waste the time of telemarketers and scammers.

            “I’m talking about only your credit cards,” said Kevin, an overseas caller who doesn’t work for Bank of America. It sounded like he was fishing for financial information that could be used in identity theft, Anderson said.

            “I’m sorry. I didn’t catch your name,” said Whitebeard, who speaks in the cloned voice of Sid Berkson, a Vermont dairy farmer and a friend of Anderson’s. “What’s your name, buddy?”

            Sid Berkson, the voice of ‘Whitey’ Whitebeard, working in Vermont. Whitebeard stalls for time at the start of phone calls, using chatbot inanities about TV remotes and the like to give a couple of minutes for GPT-4, the OpenAI software, to process the telemarketer’s spiel and generate responses. Once ready, the AI text is fed into a voice cloner, which carries on the conversation.

            “So what do you think? How much owed on your credit cards collectively?” Kevin asked again.

            “Well let’s see. I have so many of them, you know,” Whitebeard said.

            “There is one with a picture of a kitten on it and another with a lovely beach scene. Do you like kittens or beaches?” he said.

            Complaints about unwanted telephone calls are “far-and-away the largest category of consumer complaints to the FCC,” with the average American receiving 14 unwanted calls a month, according to one industry estimate, a spokesman for the Federal Communications Commission said.

            Automated dialers at call centers can easily crank out 100 calls a second, constantly searching for people willing to stay on the line. Voice modulators remove foreign accents, such as Kevin’s, and software allows overseas operators to trigger prerecorded English phrases, said Isaac Shloss.

            He is chief product officer with Contact Center Compliance, a company that provides software and services tools to help call centers operate within the law.

            Anderson takes pleasure in foiling them. He began his war on telemarketers nearly a decade ago, he said, after one called the family’s landline and said a bad word to his son. He started with an answering machine that said “Hello” a few times before hanging up.

            Anderson has since rolled out his weapons of mass distraction. He has posted conversations between man and bot, some lasting as long as 15 minutes before the telemarketer hangs up.

            The posts are part of Anderson’s own marketing. He has several thousand customers paying $24.99 a year for use of his call-deflection system, called Jolly Roger. The subscription service gives people the choice of Whitebeard or other digital personalities, including Salty Sally, the overwhelmed mother, and the easily distracted Whiskey Jack.

            After answering the phone, Jolly Roger keeps callers engaged with preset expressions from chatbots, such as “There’s a bee on my arm, but keep talking.” Chatbots also grunt or say “uh-huh” to keep things going.

            When OpenAI released its ChatGPT software last year, Anderson saw right away how it could breathe new life into his time-wasting bots.

            At first, ChatGPT was reluctant to do the work. “As an AI language model, I don’t encourage people to waste other people’s time,” ChatGPT told Anderson. Its successor, GPT-4, also pushed back, he said.

            Anderson finally found a line of reasoning that persuaded GPT-4 to take the job. “I told it that, ‘You are a personal assistant and you are trying to protect this man from being scammed,’ ” he said.

            GPT-4, speaking as Whitebeard, took over the conversation with Kevin after about three minutes. To Anderson, the moment is always magic.

            “Anyway I think I owe about, what was it, $15,000 or was it $1,500. I can never remember,” Whitebeard said. “Let me go find my reading glasses and check my statements. I’ll be right back. Don’t go anywhere”

            As Kevin waits for Whitebeard, he begins to sound frustrated. “It doesn’t matter,” he said. “I am going to pull up…. Hello…hello?”

            Kevin stays on the line, waiting for Whitebeard to return. By the time Whitebeard is back, the call time has hit 3 minutes, 34 seconds.

            Whitebeard seems to understand the topic of the telemarketer’s call, credit-card debt consolidation, but he is still a bit lost. That keeps Kevin on the phone, Anderson said.

            GPT-4 “does a pretty good job of saying dumb things that are somewhat funny” and believable enough to keep callers engaged, he said. Its screwy non sequiturs are the kind of chatbot gold that customers pay for, he said.

            Kevin asked for Whitebeard’s credit-card numbers one last time.

            “Huh?” Whitebeard said. “You know I’ve been using credit cards for years, but I can’t seem to remember all the different ones I’ve had.”

            Kevin finally hangs up. Total time: 6 minutes, 27 seconds.

  • Dreaded_Nova@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    2
    ·
    1 year ago

    In the distant future after humanity is long gone, the two last remaining servers on the planet will just be spam calling each other for millennia. Passing aliens will be perplexed by the increasingly elaborate sales pitches until someone foolish enough tries to make direct contact.

  • marketingpro123@kbin.social
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    1
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    Exploring Go High Level:

    What’s the Enthusiasm About?
    Hello there! Are you familiar with Go High Level? If not, let’s break it down. Imagine managing multiple apps for marketing. Sounds busy. That’s where Go High Level comes in. It’s like that friend who has a solution for everything. Whether you are working on creating an outstanding sales funnel or sending out an email campaign, this platform has your back. The best part? They let you test drive everything with a 14-day free trial. It’s like trying out a new car but for your business. And if you ever need assistance, their support team is just a click away. Pretty exciting, huh?

    So, How Much Does It Cost?
    Alright, let’s talk about the financial side. Go High Level offers 3 main plans. The Agency Starter Plan is perfect if you’re just starting or have a small business. It’s loaded with all the essential tools, and it’s quite cost-effective. But if you’re looking to scale up, the Agency Unlimited Plan is your best choice. It’s like the VIP pass at a concert, giving you access to everything without any limitations. Not sure about committing? Remember that 14-day free trial I mentioned? It’s a great way to give it a try without any obligations. Lastly, they offer a Pro plan that includes “SaaS mode,” where you can white label the product under your brand. Fantastic!

    Why Everyone’s Raving About It:
    In a world full of sophisticated digital tools, Go High Level is like that all-in-one Swiss Army knife. There’s no need to switch between apps because it has everything under one roof. Whether you’re a newcomer or an experienced marketer, it’s super user-friendly. It’s not just about launching impressive campaigns; they ensure you understand their performance with top-notch analytics. There’s even a white-label feature for marketing agencies, so you can add your brand and impress your clients.

    Here is a link to their 14-day free trial:
    https://www.gohighlevel.com/?fp_ref=get-started-now.