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Keeping your money safe from scams is increasingly hard in the age of artificial intelligence.
Though you can take various measures to reduce your risk of falling for a financial scam, Coinbase (COIN) chief security officer Philip Martin advised that the best first step is to “be skeptical.”
“First of all, believe nothing. Trust nothing. That should be a baseline,” Martin said on the Warrior Money podcast. “No. 2, I think it’s important, to the extent that you are contemplating a financial decision, for that not to happen in a vacuum. Talk to your friends, talk to your partner, talk to your parents. Talk to your fellow vets.”
As Patrick Murphy, co-host of Yahoo Finance’s Warrior Money pointed out, veterans may be specifically targeted by scammers. Approximately 9 in 10 veterans reported they’ve encountered a scam, according to a 2023 AARP study.
And over $1.4 billion has been taken from American veterans since 2020, the Federal Trade Commission reported, with 12% of that total stemming from government impostors.
AI has also helped expedite scammers’ actions. They can use tools to disguise accents and create a false sense of familiarity with the target. AI can also handle the first half of a conversation and then hand it off to a human once the fraud is already well underway.
“[AI] can do all sorts of things that enable very targeted exploitation and do it at scale, which is scary when we talk about financial fraud and victims,” Martin said. “It also enables the scammers to be much more efficient in how they do things.”
Martin warned that one key indicator of fraud is when you’re being rushed or pressured into a decision, with the instruction not to tell anyone else what you’re doing before it’s done.
“The No. 1 indicator that I see of people being scammed is they’re encouraged not to share what they’re about to do with anyone else,” Martin said.
Martin recommended consumers keep two things in mind when making financial decisions.
First, “Talk to your friends, talk to your partner, talk to your parents, talk to your brothers and sisters, talk to your fellow vets” when contemplating financial decisions, he said. “You should always be transparent. You should be willing to talk to your parents or whoever.”
“And No. 2, it should not be made under time pressure,” he continued. “If someone is telling you you have to move now, they’re probably scamming you.”
Each week, Warrior Money will dive into the financial topics that matter most to veterans and the broader public. You can find more episodes on our video hub or watch on your preferred streaming service.
