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TUCSON, Ariz. (13 News) – The Pima County Sheriff’s Department said fraud is up nationwide as scammers find more creative ways to target victims.
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The PCSD said the scams are different and more complex than in the past, with a lot of the changes occurring in the past few months.
PCSD’s fraud unit said a lot of that has to do with the rapid growth of artificial intelligence, which makes it harder for victims to tell when a scam is a scam.
A local woman said she was scammed multiple times on popular social media apps through the use of AI.
“I am trusting and believing,” said Barbara Glover.
That personality trait tied Glover into multiple online scams within the past few months.
“Just because you wouldn’t do something like that – there are a hundred and thousand people who would do something like that,” Glover said.
Glover said she learned that after she fell for three separate scams, all slightly different, but all including AI.
Glover said she got on the neighborhood app, Nextdoor, looking for work. She came across someone asking for a dog sitter, offering to pay a couple thousand dollars up front for Glover to buy dog food, toys, and other supplies for the job.
“I’m self-employed; I’ve always been self-employed. I have a lot of jobs, always had a lot of jobs. This is right up my alley, right? Wrong,” Glover said.
Glover said she received a check in the mail and took it into the bank to cash. Once she got there, the bank told her the check was fraudulent.
Glover said she didn’t take any money out of her account, but PCSD Financial Crimes and Fraud Unit Detective Tyler Rivas said that’s not always the case.
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“What happens when you deposit that check – it might go through for a day or two, and then your bank realizes that it’s fraudulent, but you had already withdrawn cash, so actually you’re out that cash that you withdrew because you’re responsible for it,” Rivas said.
Rivas said that’s been happening for years, but what’s new is how easy it is to fall for now because of the added use of AI.
Glover said she was talking to the people who gave her the check over the phone and thought they were real, only to eventually realize it was all AI.
“We have seen videos that somebody might take off of social media and use a sort of software to change it to make it look like somebody else. So you might not even know who you’re talking to,” Rivas said.
Rivas said that in addition to the rise of social media apps being used for scams, more money is being scammed from people nationwide than ever before.
Glover took to the Nextdoor app to warn others, and saw dozens commenting that they’ve experienced a lot of the same.
“I want them not to have their heart broken, not to have their integrity stolen, their trust given freely,” Glover said.
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