It is said that fraudulent workshops in Southeast Asia, including Myanmar, are actively using generative artificial intelligence (AI) ChatGPT for crimes and receiving great help. It is explained that it is much easier to deceive victims by writing a much more convincing fraudulent message using ChatGPT.
According to Reuters on the 16th, Kenyan man Duncan Ockindo came to Thailand in December last year after receiving a job offer.
However, as soon as he got off at Bangkok Airport, he was taken to KK Park, a notorious crime complex in Myanmar’s southeastern province of Cain that borders Thailand. He is known to have sent a message to induce Americans to invest in fake virtual currency while sitting in front of a PC in a spacious room with hundreds of similarly taken colleagues.
In order to approach the victims, Okindo was helped a lot by ChatGPT, impersonating a rancher from Texas or a soybean producer from Alabama. He explained that he and his colleagues were able to speak naturally and use local expressions like Americans through ChatGPT.
Okindo also immediately sent a plausible answer to ChatGPT when a fraudulent target asked about virtual currency, and used ChatGPT to create and use new fraudulent methods on the spot.
He worked inside the fortified complex guarded by heavily armed guards, where his colleagues, who failed to meet their assigned fraud goals, were beaten and electro-shocked.
Then, in April, the Thai government was released and returned to Kenya after a major crackdown, including cutting off power supplies to KK Park and other places.
Okindo emphasized that ChatGPT is “the most commonly used AI tool for scammers to cheat.”
Two other Myanmar men also told Reuters that they used ChatGPT to commit fraud at the workplace. One of them said that he was able to attract dozens of victims at the same time through poems and seductive messages created by ChatGPT while doing romance scams in 2022.
He confessed that ChatGPT’s convincing speech made victims trust him more, adding, “Working with AI was really efficient.”
In a related development, ChatGPT operator OpenAI told Reuters it was “actively working to detect and block ChatGPT being misused in connection with fraud.”
In addition, the AI model, which is the basis of ChatGPT, rejects requests that go against its anti-fraud regulations, adding that the company monitors related misuses and blocks violators from using them.
EJ SONG
US ASIA JOURNAL
