Enslaved in a scam
You’ve heard about people losing their money to online scams — romance, crypto, tech support, real estate and countless other types. But have you ever wondered who is doing the scamming? A large number of scammers are using innocent people to con and steal money against their wills.
🥹 I teared up: After losing her voice to a rare neurological disorder, Congresswoman Jennifer Wexton used AI to get it back. ElevenLabs created a text-to-speech model from her past voice recordings that sounds just like her! She used it to advocate for others with disabilities in the first AI voiced-cloned speech on the House floor. Watch this truly amazing vid.
Mom who allowed her 5-year-old to play with her phone captures a priceless moment
Delphine Expert gave her 5-year-old daughter, Zoey, her phone to record “treasures” she found on a walk, but she never expected “to be one of the treasures.”
65% of people
Worry AI will become uncontrollable. It’s already made us way more vulnerable to scams. It might be time to rewatch “The Terminator,” “The Matrix,” “I, Robot,” “Blade Runner,” “Westworld” … you get the point.
Coming for the king: OpenAI is testing a free web search tool. SearchGPT has a search box just like Google, but you can ask conversational follow-up questions. It’ll be available for a small group of folks before launching in ChatGPT. Wow, Google is going down!
💊 This is nuts: Anyone with an internet connection and a few thousand in crypto can make $3 million worth of fentanyl. Chinese sellers will ship you the compounds in about six weeks. It’s 50 times stronger than heroin, and cartel cooks say it’s as easy to make as chicken soup. So scary. You’re gonna wanna read this one.
Sit, DoS, rollover: The Department of Homeland Security now has a dog-like robot that disables smart devices on the go. Need to surprise a suspect? The robo-pup, “NEO,” can launch a denial-of-service (DoS) attack to take out the doorbell cam and other connected security systems. Crazy!
🔮 Psychic sex scam: Gina Russell will serve 10 years for extorting $4 million from her victims (paywall link) as a phony medium. She told one woman “darkness” was following her and convinced her to wire her $180,000 to “cleanse her negative energy.” When the woman’s family finally cut her off, Russell pressured her into sex work. Think she saw prison in her future? Btw, there are tons of scammy psychics online. Watch out.
Rep. Jennifer Wexton first ever to make House floor speech using AI voice
Rep. Jennifer Wexton of Virginia delivered what is believed to be the first speech ever from the House floor using artificial intelligence voice technology. Wexton was diagnosed last year with a rare neurological disorder that robbed her of her ability to speak clearly.
🦍 Please don’t stream the apes: Gorillas in zoos like seeing pics and watching videos of themselves on your phone. When a visitor shows them their screen, they’ll even flick or tap on the glass to “scroll” to the next vid (paywall link). Now, even the gorillas are addicted to screens.