Description: Deborah Del Mastro of Martinez, California, reportedly wired $5,400 to Mexico after scammers falsely claimed her daughter Sarah had been kidnapped and played what she believed was Sarah's panicked voice. AI had reportedly been used to mimic the daughter's voice during a five-hour call that pressured Del Mastro to send money. After she contacted her daughter and learned she was safe, Martinez police reportedly began investigating.
Entities
View all entitiesAlleged: Deepfake technology developers and Voice cloning technology developers developed an AI system deployed by Scammers and Fake kidnapping scammers, which harmed Deborah Del Mastro , Daughter of Deborah Del Mastro , Epistemic integrity , Victims of impersonation scams and Victims of fake kidnapping scammers.
Alleged implicated AI systems: Deepfake technology , Voice cloning technology and Voice synthesis technology
Incident Stats
Incident ID
1505
Report Count
1
Incident Date
2026-05-24
Editors
Daniel Atherton
Incident Reports
Reports Timeline
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MARTINEZ, Calif. (KGO) -- Thousands of dollars were stolen from a Bay Area woman after scammers used artificial intelligence to mimic her daughter's voice in what authorities describe as a growing type of fraud.
Deborah Del Mastro said the …
Variants
A "variant" is an AI incident similar to a known case—it has the same causes, harms, and AI system. Instead of listing it separately, we group it under the first reported incident. Unlike other incidents, variants do not need to have been reported outside the AIID. Learn more from the research paper.
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