LLMs and the economics of Evil, Inc., with Manish Goregaokar
Summary
Patrick McKenzie and Manoush discuss how LLMs are lowering the cost of sophisticated fraud, enabling attackers to run scams like business email compromise as scalable businesses. They explore specific threats, such as phishing via fake job interviews to steal Single Sign-On credentials and deepfake voice attacks, which allow criminals to impersonate authority figures. The episode also covers the challenges of defending against these evolving tactics, emphasizing that individuals must verify communications through trusted channels rather than relying on spoofable caller IDs or email addresses.
Topics discussed
Introduction and guest overview
LLMs automating sophisticated scams
Job interview phishing and credential theft
Deepfake voice attacks and CEO impersonation
Business Email Compromise and money laundering
Ransomware payments and targeted attacks
Supply chain attacks and money mules
Money laundering stages and Breaking Bad analogy
Sponsor: Mercury banking features
Sponsor: Granola meeting notes
Geopolitics of scam gangs and LLM impact
Security best practices and spoofing risks
Real estate wire transfer scams
Government phishing and credit card fraud
Sponsor: MongoDB data layer
Victim psychology and family safety protocols
Urgency tactics and regulatory protections
Open source models and future threat landscape
Listen ad-free on Castria