(This appeared in Newsday’s Act2 section)
Deflecting robocalls is simple enough, if aggravating and time consuming. (My wife likes to mess with the callers, telling those who claim to have great life insurance offers that she isn’t interested because she’s 100 years old, or shutting down home insurance pitches by declaring she lives in her car.) But now the scammers have invaded my dinky little website, flooding the comments page with overtures to find magical success in business and health without my extending any effort whatsoever.
“Make money in your sleep with these INCREDIBLE A.I. Bots,” one promised. “Artificial Intelligence is taking over and helping ordinary people make money in their sleep. Literally!”
And: “Are you tired of the dull, straightforward approach to SEO? Fear not! ChatGPT has got you covered with these hilarious prompts that will have you laughing your way to the top of the SERPs.”
Ha. Ha.
There is this one fellow (“Hi, Eric here” — I assume he’s a real person and, if true, he’s a tireless so-and-so) who makes contact two, three, four times a day, telling me what a terrific website I have but how I need to take advantage of his masterful skills (and A.I. tools) to get more attention.
Others are less personal, addressing me as “dear business owner [who is] working hard on your business … but can use technology to help you supplement and, over time, even replace your income. ChatGPT and AI are here.”
Yeah, yeah.
My website isn’t a business at all, merely a bit of self-indulgent entertainment mulling such heavy topics as sports, hobbies and life experiences. But here comes another: “Having a hard time coming up with all the social media content for your business? If I told you that you can eliminate the stress today would you beleive [sic] me?”
Well, no, if you can’t spell “believe.”
I have been told that my business doesn’t have a proper Google map citation. I have been informed that somebody named Glynn “has revealed how he makes 30k a month” and “now YOU can ‘clone’ his exact online business … and it’s powered by A-I.”
I have been provided unsolicited advice in Spanish: “Resena sobre la importancia de sin Seguro conductor cobertura …” — something about the importance of auto insurance, says Google Translate — etc., etc. Also in what could be Serbian, Bulgarian or Russian; it’s written in the Cyrillic alphabet.
Da.
No reason to translate them because there hardly is time to get through the endless stream of the ones in English — often fractured English — that “guarantee the production of blog articles, social media posts, GoogleAd copy, FacebookAd copy, LinkedIn sales pitches, all your promotional materials, all your emails and so so so much more.”
Which comes, by the way, with “no strings attached.”
And how did this one get in here? “Hi there! I understand that you are looking for ways to improve your posture and contribute to a healthy lifestyle … Looking for a healthy and effective way to shed those extra pounds?”
There’s also the flattery angle. “I do not even know how I ended up here, but I thought this post was great,” a recent message started, purporting to comment on my treatise on England’s King Charles or global warming or unwise wagers at the horse track. “I don’t know who you are but certainly you are going to be a famous blogger if you are not already.”
As dubious as that sounded, at least it wasn’t threatening.
“We have hacked your website johnjeansonne.com and extracted your databases,” an ominous new item warned, which “would be detrimental to your personal image …. Now you can put a stop to this by paying a $3000 fee (0.11 BTC) in bitcoin to the following address [provided with a link]….We will be notified of payment which we will then delete the information we have obtained. You have 72 hours to do so….”
Eric? Is that you?