DeepfakeHigh
FBI Reports Ongoing Vishing and Smishing Campaign Allegedly Targeting Government Officials Using Purportedly AI-Generated Voices
- Occurred
- May 15, 2025
- Published
- May 15, 2025
- Source
- AI Incident Database
Summary
According to a May 15, 2025 public alert from the FBI and IC3, malicious actors have been using purported AI-generated voice messages and smishing tactics since April 2025 to impersonate senior U.S. officials. The campaign reportedly targets government personnel and their contacts to gain access to personal or official accounts. The FBI warns the scheme may involve credential theft and social engineering, with AI voice cloning used to increase believability.
Developers
- Deepfake technology developers
- Synthetic audio generation technology developers
- Generative AI developers
Deployers
- Scammers
Harmed parties
- United States state government officials
- United States federal government officials
- Former United States government officials
- Family and friends of United States government officials
Tags
- deepfake
- voice cloning
- synthetic media
- vishing
- smishing
- impersonation
- social engineering
- fraud
- scam
- government officials targeted
- high-value target impersonation
- public figure impersonation
- identity-based attack
- social engineering campaign
- account takeover attempt
- cybersecurity threat
- credential compromise risk
- trust erosion
- deception
- national security risk
- United States
- FBI
- IC3
- federal government personnel
- state government personnel
- mobile messaging
- telephony-based AI attacks
- SMS impersonation
- multi-platform threat vector
- variant
Classification
Category confidence: 90%
Severity confidence: 85%
Rationale: AI voice cloning used for impersonation and credential theft constitutes deepfake technology with significant security risks.
Classifier: Qwen/Qwen3.5-35B-A3B-FP8