The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is working on protections against artificial intelligence (AI) based fraud. The FTC outlined the agency’s efforts to use all the tools at its disposal to address the rapid emergence of new technologies powered by AI and their potential risks to consumers and businesses. 

As part of the agency’s law enforcement work, the FTC has taken action against companies that deceive users about their use of AI or use AI in unfair ways. For example, the FTC alleged that Amazon and Ring used highly private data — voice recordings collected by Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant and videos collected by Ring’s internet-connected home security cameras — to train their algorithms while violating customers’ privacy.

In its comment, FTC staff also discussed the agency’s efforts to combat AI-enabled voice cloning. Scammers are using voice cloning technology to impersonate family or friends, business executives or others to obtain money from consumers.