{"id":176225,"date":"2023-11-08T09:44:54","date_gmt":"2023-11-08T17:44:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mcafee.com\/blogs\/?p=176225"},"modified":"2024-07-31T11:17:11","modified_gmt":"2024-07-31T18:17:11","slug":"scam-texts-are-more-painful-than-getting-a-root-canal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mcafee.com\/blogs\/internet-security\/scam-texts-are-more-painful-than-getting-a-root-canal\/","title":{"rendered":"Scam Texts Are More Painful Than Getting a Root Canal"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sick and tired of scam messages? So are the 54% of Americans who said they\u2019d rather get a root canal than fall for one of those scams.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

That\u2019s one of the striking findings we uncovered in our Global Scam Message Study. We surveyed more than 7,000 adults worldwide <\/span>\u2014<\/span> including more than 1,000 in the U.S. for their thoughts on scam messages and texts. And just how painful they are.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

If it seems like you\u2019re getting more scam messages than before, you\u2019re not alone. We found that Americans receive an average of 11.6 fake messages or scams each day. And it\u2019s getting tougher to tell what\u2019s real and what\u2019s fake. More than 80% of Americans said that it\u2019s harder than ever to spot if a text, email, or social media message is a scam.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What\u2019s driving this fresh flood of increasingly believable scam messages? AI \u2013 and if you\u2019ve tuned into our blogs this past year, that likely comes as little surprise.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

As we\u2019ve reported, the bad actors out there have supercharged their scams with AI tools. Effectively, AI makes it far easier to spin up their scams in two significant ways:<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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  1. AI does the writing for them.<\/span><\/b> Instead of spending hours cooking up scam-worthy stories, AI does the work in seconds.<\/span>
    \n<\/span><\/li>\n
  2. AI makes the messages look more legit.<\/span><\/b> Before<\/span> AI tools, you\u2019d often find scam messages loaded with typos and grammatical errors. And <\/span>sometimes<\/span> they felt awkward. They didn\u2019t make sense when you read them. Not so with AI. It can write far more smoothly than many bad actors can.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    With that comes the inevitable fallout. Two-thirds (65%) of Americans have clicked or fallen for a scam. Of them, 45% lost money as a result, and 15% of them lost more than $1,000.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

    Engaging with scam messages can be costly and stressful. <\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/h2>\n

    Now, about that root canal stat. People who fall victim to online messaging scams really do find it painful. Particularly as the time and money lost to those scams take their toll. Some people found them so painful, they said they\u2019d rather deal with the following instead:<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n