Apate uses AI bots to counter online scammers
Australian company Apate uses approximately 350,000 AI bots to answer scam calls, infiltrate scam chat groups, and reply to text messages, aiming to stall scammers and collect intelligence in real time. It has so far collected over 250,000 pieces of scammer information, including scam URLs, money mule accounts, and banking information. Its founder Dali Kaafar said Apate's calls often last over two hours, and the demo version tested by WIRED failed to get the AI to take the bait. Research by ETH Zurich researcher Mark Vero found that LLM-driven honeypots can make AI attackers attack longer, and are detected.