An AI program designed to mimic a sweet, elderly woman has become the bane of phone scammers' existence. Dubbed "Daisy," this digital "granny" is deployed by O2, the mobile phone network, to tie up fraudsters and expose the scourge of phone scams.
Daisy is programmed to sound like a typical elderly lady, complete with a fondness for tea, endearing use of "dear," and meandering stories. These quirks, however, are anything but charming for the scammers who find themselves ensnared by Daisy's elaborate, fabricated life.
In recorded exchanges, scammers can be heard growing increasingly frustrated as Daisy, oblivious to their attempts at deception, spins tales of knitting, bank details, and a fondness for "gosh" and "how time flies." One scammer, after nearly an hour of Daisy's "dithering," exclaims, "It's nearly been an hour! For the love of [beep]" to which Daisy calmly replies, "Gosh, how time flies."
Daisy's creation was inspired by Jim Browning, a YouTuber who has built a following by exposing scams and turning the tables on fraudsters. Daisy, while seemingly a harmless, even humorous, tool, serves a crucial purpose: it highlights the growing problem of phone scams and disrupts the scammers' operations.
According to the Crime Survey, there were 3.2 million fraud incidents in the year ending March 2024. Older people are particularly vulnerable, with Age UK estimating that 800,000 people aged 65 or older were victims in 2019.
The impact of phone scams is significant. In 2021, Action Fraud reported £10 million stolen in courier scams, where victims are persuaded to withdraw money by criminals posing as police officers or bank officials. Recently, Azeem Mohammed, 33, was convicted of swindling £1.5 million from pensioners, including a former bank manager.
The House of Lords, in 2022, urged telecoms companies to take "swifter and firmer action" to combat the surge in fraudulent communications. Since then, Ofcom, the communications regulator, has forced phone companies to block more calls from abroad that mimic UK landline numbers.
Virgin Media O2, the parent company of O2, boasts that they blocked over £250 million in suspected fraudulent transactions last year, equivalent to stopping one fraudulent transaction every two minutes. The company has called for a dedicated minister for fraud and a radical overhaul of policing, citing the abysmal success rate in prosecuting fraud cases.
While the police secure only 84 fraud convictions per force on average, Ofcom encourages the public to forward suspicious calls and texts to 7726, a number that spells "SPAM" on keypads, enabling phone companies to block them.
Murray Mackenzie, Virgin Media O2's director of fraud, believes that Daisy is "turning the tables" on scammers, exposing their deception and reminding people to be vigilant. He stresses that, "No matter how persuasive someone on the other end of the phone may be, they arenât always who you think they are." He urges the public to play their part by reporting suspicious calls and texts, helping to curtail the prevalence of fraud.