BBB: AI Is Making Scam Calls Smarter and More Personal

The BBB's Warning

In August 2026, the Better Business Bureau issued a formal warning about scammers using artificial intelligence to run more convincing and more automated phone and text scams. The warning came backed by data from a BBB study of over 433,000 Scam Tracker reports filed since 2022.

Scam calls and texts are rising sharply, and the tools scammers use are getting cheaper and easier to access.

What AI Does for Scammers

A scammer finds a short video or audio clip of your family member on social media. Maybe a birthday post, maybe a graduation video. Twenty to thirty seconds of audio is enough for modern voice cloning tools to generate a convincing fake voice. From there, the scammer can call you sounding exactly like your son or daughter, saying they're in trouble and need money fast.

The BBB flagged social media audio as a primary source scammers use to clone voices. That selfie video your mom posted on Facebook, the Instagram reel your college student put up, all of it can serve as raw material. Beyond voice cloning, scammers also use internet-based phone services to spoof caller ID, making a call appear to come from a trusted number, and automated tools let them personalize messages at scale so texts feel like they were written just for you.

The Numbers

The BBB's analysis covered more than 433,000 Scam Tracker reports since 2022, and the volume of reports involving phone and text contact has climbed each year. Consumers reported over 37,700 scam calls through July 2026 alone, nearly 5,400 per month. For context, the Federal Trade Commission reported that phone-based fraud cost Americans over $1.1 billion in 2023. With AI tools lowering the barrier for scammers, 2026 figures are expected to climb further.

Why Slowing Down Isn't Enough

The BBB advises people to slow down and avoid sending money under pressure. Scammers rely on urgency, and that advice is sound. But slowing down only helps if you have something to slow down toward, a way to check, a method to verify.

Most families don't have that. If your phone rings and the voice sounds exactly like your daughter saying she was in a car accident and needs money right now, what do you actually do? Hang up and call her back? What if the scammer tells you her phone is broken? What if the caller ID already showed her number?

The scam is designed to remove every normal verification tool you have.

The Question That Stops the Scam

Trust Onion gives families three rotating codewords. The words change every 60 seconds, calculated locally on each person's phone, with no server required and no internet connection needed. If someone calls claiming to be your family member, you ask one question: "What are the words?"

An AI voice clone can't answer that. A scammer doesn't have your family's words. And because the words expire every 60 seconds, even someone who overheard them would find them useless almost immediately.

The BBB is right that scammers are getting better at sounding real. But they can't know something that only your family knows, rotating in real time, on a 60-second schedule. That one question ends the scam in three seconds.

What the BBB Recommends

The BBB's guidance covers several areas: be skeptical of urgent requests involving money, don't send gift cards, wire transfers, or cryptocurrency under pressure, think carefully about audio you post to social media, and verify the caller's identity through a separate channel.

All of this is solid. The hardest part for most families is that last step. Verifying through a separate channel assumes you have a reliable one. If the scammer is spoofing your family member's actual phone number, calling back isn't a clean solution.

A shared family codeword system gives you that separate channel. It doesn't require a phone call or a working cell connection. It just requires asking one question and knowing what the answer should be.

A Small Habit With Real Protection

Trust Onion is free, and setup takes a few minutes. Getting your family on board is as simple as explaining: "If someone calls saying they're me and something is wrong, ask them for the words."

That one sentence could protect a grandparent from a fake emergency call or a parent from a spoofed call claiming their kid is in danger. It works because it creates a shared secret that AI can't access, spoof, or clone.

The BBB's warning is worth taking seriously. Scammers aren't slowing down, and their tools keep improving. Awareness matters, but it's not enough on its own. Families need a verification method they can actually use in the moment, under pressure, in seconds. Three rotating codewords are that method.