O2 has brilliantly matured to telescammers. AI old lady Daisy keeps them on a wire so they can’t rob others

Nowadays, we all use artificial intelligence for something different. For some, it finds use in data analysis, image generation, and text creation, while others use it to commit activities, often at the limits of the law. And then we have O2, which AI cleverly used in fighting phone scammers.

AI Grandma Daisy loves to chat

Daisy is the latest addition to the UK operator O2’s team. Unlike her colleagues, who are in charge of the satisfaction of existing clients, AI Grandma Daisy is created for the employment of fraudsters who try to extort sensitive data and subsequently money from people through phone calls.

Daisy was created using a number of different AI models to be almost indistinguishable from a human and able to hold a conversation with the cheater for as long as possible. The AI ​​first listens to the caller, transcribes their voice into text and responds to them via a large language model complete with a “chatty old lady personality”. All in real time, as if it were a real conversation between two living beings.

The creation of old lady Daisy was also helped by the largest YouTube channel focusing on Internet and telephone fraudsters Jim Browning. According to O2, ‘scammbaiter Daisy’ is so successful that she has been able to keep a number of scammers on the line for up to 40 minutes at a time. While the fraudsters tried to get sensitive information from her, the old lady told them about her cats, her passion for knitting or pricked them with fake personal information.

People would like to retaliate against cheaters, but they regret the lost time

As part of the Sverve the Scammers campaign (for which AI Daisy was created, after all), research was also carried out, which showed that 7 out of 10 Britons would like to fight against scammers, but regret the effort and time wasted. More than two-thirds of Britons fear being the target of a scam and one in five people experience a scam every week.

If people report a scam like this, they can simply forward the scammer to 7726, where that chatty old lady Daisy will take care of them. At the same time, through this redirection, O2 is able to investigate and block the numbers used by fraudsters. Interestingly, O2 blocked 89 million texts in this way last year alone.

source: O2