Clark Hoefnagels, a resident of Ontario, Canada, took matters into his own hands after his grandmother fell victim to a scam, losing $27,000 (£21,000) last year. Motivated by a sense of responsibility to protect his family, Hoefnagels created an AI-powered tool called Catch to spot scam emails.
The idea for Catch stemmed from running his grandmother’s scam emails through the AI chatbot ChatGPT, which immediately identified them as fraudulent. This led to the development of Catch, which scans incoming emails on Google’s Gmail and highlights any that are deemed fraudulent or potentially so.
While AI tools like ChatGPT have the potential to enhance various industries, they are also being used by scammers to facilitate fraud. Reports show a significant increase in the use of AI to try to fool banks’ systems, with FraudGPT being sold on the dark web to create bank-related phishing emails and scam web pages.
Despite the growing threat of AI-powered scams, Hoefnagels found that the public’s apathy towards protecting themselves from scams hindered the adoption of Catch. He discovered that people, even after being scammed, were not interested in using the tool for protection.
In response to the lack of interest, Hoefnagels is winding down the Catch business and looking for a potential buyer. However, financial institutions are taking the threat of AI-powered scams seriously, with two-thirds of finance firms seeing it as a growing threat and banks increasingly using AI to fight back.
Tech firms like Strise and Featurespace are developing AI software to help banks spot fraudulent transactions and unusual behavior. Featurespace, for example, tracks the behavior of genuine customers to identify anomalies and has contracts with banks in 27 different countries.
While Hoefnagels initially faced frustration with the public’s lack of awareness about the risks of scams, he now focuses on pushing companies and governments to address the issue. As the battle against cyber criminals continues, the development and implementation of AI technology play a crucial role in protecting individuals and institutions from fraudulent activities.
