This is awesome. Apparently, there was a spoof of the Secretary of State that was so well done that people actually believed it was him! Plus, it was done through Signal, the same program that gave us SignalGate 1 and 2. (THAT was something to behold.) From Malwarebytes:
Deepfake attacks aren’t just for recruitment and banking fraud; they’ve now reached the highest levels of government. News emerged this week of an AI-powered attack that impersonated US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Authorities don’t know who was behind the incident.
As if our “government” didn’t have enough troubles with the Epstein files and all the tariff nonsense, and tRump attacking Iran (yes, old news, but it needs to be mentioned), where we are waiting for the retaliation, and so on. That retaliation is going to be something to see. How many innocent people are going to die?
Whoops, I wandered a little off topic there. Let’s continue on with two (Little) Marco Rubios, shall we? It could have been worse, as in he now holds *four* positions in the “government”. He is Secretary of State (obviously), national security advisor, acting head for USAID (of course, that organization is gone, thank you to the assholes who did it DOGE), and acting archivist for the National Archives and Records Administration. Isn’t that a mouthful? And he’s wretched at all of them.
A US State Department cable seen by the Washington Post warned that someone impersonated Rubio’s voice and writing style in voice and text messages on the Signal messaging app. The attacker reportedly tried to gain access to information or accounts by contacting multiple government officials in Rubio’s name. Their targets included three foreign ministers, a US governor, and a US member of Congress, the cable said. The attacker created a Signal account with the display name ‘[email protected]’ and invited targets to communicate on Signal.
I would say that was pretty creative. With the good of AI comes the bad, like this. There are a lot of concerns about AI that haven’t been addressed, such as how much power they need, because the answer is a LOT. Just ask the people living next to Elon’s gigantic AI setup. But, there are always talented attackers who make use of it for nefarious purposes.
The Rubio deepfake isn’t the first time that impersonators have targeted government officials. In May, someone impersonated White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles in calls and texts to her contacts. Several failed to spot the scam initially and interacted with the attacker as though the conversations were legitimate. This incident wasn’t Rubio’s fault; attacks like these are becoming commonplace with scammers making use of popular messaging tools. Signal is apparently a widely-used app in the executive branch, to the point that Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said it came pre-installed on government devices.
Why should you worry about such attacks on government high-ups? For one thing, it’s scary to think that foreign states might actually get away with sensitive information this way. But it also shows how easy it can be to impersonate someone with a deepfake. You can mount audio attacks with just a few snippets of audio to train an algorithm on.
This isn’t limited to higher officials. I was almost caught in a scam interview and “hired” for a job. And yes, I have Signal to talk to friends overseas. But! I’m a lot more wary now. You should be, too, no matter what programs you use. Marco Rubio the 2nd showed us that.
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Am I the only person who finds it hard to believe that Signal came pre-loaded on government phones? If so, who’s bright idea was that?
It certainly makes less than no sense. The program *can* be hacked, witness this column. It’s one thing if they want to send quick notes to others. But, SignalGate 1 and 2 prove that they talk about things that should be done in an SCIF, that is, a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility. And it still makes me flip because Waltz was TALKING WITH PUTIN at the same time the military strikes were happening! But the phones come with the program installed? What kind of stupidity is this? And, we only found out about 2. What else has happened? Thanks for the comment!