Mum’s terror as daughter’s voice cloned in $1 million ransom scam: ‘So chilling’

A mother fooled by the sound of her daughter’s voice, cloned using AI technology and weaponised against her by scammers has delivered an urgent a warning for other parents.

US mum Jennifer Destefano said the sound of her daughter “crying and pleading” was so realistic that she completely believed she was being held hostage by the men, who threatened to traffic her and demanded a $1 million ransom.

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The moment the Arizona mother heard the scammers voice explaining what he would do to her daughter as she exited her car on the way to pick up her younger daughter from dance class, she became hysterical.

“It was my daughter’s voice ... and she’s crying and sobbing and saying: ‘Mum’,” she told Sunrise.

When Destefano asked her daughter “what’s happened?” the voice of her daughter replied: “Mum I messed up.”

Then she heard a man’s voice say: “Lay down, put your head back.”

She thought her daughter had been hurt and was being put on a stretcher because at the time she was away on a ski trip.

But then she heard her daughter’s voice again: “Mum, these bad men have me, help me, help me, help me.”

“She was crying and pleading,” Destefano said.

“Listen here I have your daughter, if you call the police, if you call anybody I’m going to pop her full of drugs, I’m gonna have my way with her, I’m gonna drop her off in Mexico, and you’ll never see her again,” she recalls a man’s voice threatening.

“I started shaking and soliciting help, just screaming for help,” Destefano said.

Two nearby women ran to help Destefano, one of them calling police.

“(Police) tipped us off that this is a common scam that’s going on, it’s very accessible to get through an app or download off the internet.”

But even after the police warning, Destefano said she was unable to believe her daughter was safe.

“(The scammers) proceeded to want ransom, we were going through negotiation, they wanted to physically come pick me up with the cash.”

She said it was so realistic, that even when her husband told her he had their daughter, she needed to speak with her before believing she was safe.

‘That’s her crying for me’

“Her voice was so on point, it was so chilling,” Destefano said.

“When they were able to finally locate my daughter with my husband, I didn’t believe that she was really with him, I doubted it, and I kept saying: ‘That’s not possible, I heard her, I spoke to her, that’s her crying for me.’

“When I finally got to talk with my daughter, and she reassured me she was safe, that was when I finally believed it, because I couldn’t process it. I was so sure it was her voice.

Destefano contacted the police following the ordeal to see what could be done but was told that because no crime committed, they couldn’t do anything further.

It was considered a prank call by law enforcement.

Destefano urges parents to establish a safe word with their family members, which can be used in an emergency situation, to confirm identity.

AI technology now just needs a three-second audio sample from a person to replicate their voice, according to cybersecurity experts.

While many people now have audiovisual recordings plastered all over social media from which scammers can collect samples, Destefano said her daughter didn’t have any public social media accounts.

But she said her daughter’s voice was available publicly online, in interviews with her school and sports groups.