Approached with a Voice-Cloned Message Using AI
Prime Minister Pattama Chinawath of Thailand warned of a near-miss incident where she almost fell victim to a voice phishing scam involving the voice of a foreign leader.
On the 16th, local media including the Bangkok Post and AFP reported that Prime Minister Pattama revealed to reporters that she had nearly been deceived by a sophisticated voice phishing scam the previous day, which impersonated a neighboring country's leader using voice replication. Prime Minister Pattama said she received a voice message in the well-known voice of a foreign leader, containing a message expressing "looking forward to meeting and hoping to work together." In response, she replied "understood" via text message. Later, she received a reply saying they would contact her again.
Prime Minister Pattama went to bed early and missed a call around 11 p.m. She then sent a text apologizing for not answering the phone the next day. The impersonator, pretending to be the foreign leader, then said, "Thailand is the only ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) country that has not yet donated," and requested a donation.
Prime Minister Pattama said she was somewhat surprised and suspicious of the donation request, and only confirmed it was a scam after verifying that the bank account number provided belonged to a third country. She stated, "I want to inform and warn people that I too almost became a victim," and urged, "We must acknowledge that scams are becoming increasingly sophisticated and cunning." The Prime Minister requested the Ministry of Digital Economy and Society to handle the case. However, she did not disclose the identity of the foreign leader impersonated by the voice phishing perpetrators.
Recently, with the advancement of AI technology, crimes involving 'deepfake' videos that create realistic images of real people have increased, followed by phishing crimes using 'deepvoice' technology that perfectly replicates a specific person's voice to generate fake statements. In fact, in October 2021, a bank in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) was deceived by a deepvoice voice phishing scam mimicking the voice of an executive from a company they regularly dealt with, resulting in a transfer of 35 million dollars (approximately 42 billion won). In March 2023, in Canada, parents were tricked by the fake voice of their son and transferred 21,000 Canadian dollars (about 20 million won).
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Pattama is the youngest daughter of Thaksin Chinawath, a telecommunications tycoon and former Prime Minister from 2001 to 2006. She became Thailand's youngest prime minister last year at the age of 37.
© The Asia Business Daily(www.asiae.co.kr). All rights reserved.
