Sam Altman is “terrified” of voice ID fraudsters embracing AI — and threats of US bioweapon attacks keep him up at night

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Crafty individuals and hackers are gradually favoring advanced strategies that make their deceitful tactics harder for unaware users to detect. Even more concerning, these attackers are using artificial intelligence with a generative capacity to bypass protective measures aimed at securing sensitive information.

In a talk at the Federal Reserve’s Regulatory Capital Framework Conference in Washington D.C on Tuesday, Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, expressed his worries about banks still relying on voice authentication. As artificial intelligence becomes more widespread, this could potentially give unscrupulous individuals access to sensitive data. (Based on Business Insider’s report)

Based on what the executive mentioned, it seems concerning to him that certain financial institutions still rely on voice prints for authentication, allowing large sums of money to be transferred or other actions to be performed.

Altman expressed his viewpoint that it’s surprising that voice authentication is still being used in banking, stating instead that “AI has largely outsmarted the methods people use to authenticate, except for passwords.”

He found it odd that banks are still using voice authentication, implying that AI has mostly figured out other ways of authentication, apart from passwords.

The CEO expressed concern about AI possibly leading to a major upcoming fraud issue, urging financial institutions to devise more secure and reliable methods for verifying client identities, ones that cannot be manipulated by AI technology.

The general approach society takes to addressing this issue will need to evolve, and it’s essential for individuals to adapt their interactions and verification methods. This is quite significant.

OpenAI CEO, Sam Altman

Here’s what keeps Sam Altman up at night

In a thorough question-and-answer period, Sam Altman was inquired about the things that often worry him before sleep. He responded by mentioning that a major financial assault was one of his primary concerns.

In simpler terms, the high-ranking official described a hypothetical situation where an enemy of the U.S. might have infiltrated a highly advanced artificial intelligence system, planning to deploy bioweapons against the country as an attack. Additionally, he warned that malicious actors could exploit AI technology to breach financial systems and drain everyone’s accounts.

It might be even more alarming that Altman suggested we’d have limited options to address the issue if it arises, as he likened it to dealing with a skilled athlete in an extreme sport who possesses advanced AI technology. In other words, it would be challenging to maintain complex and safeguarding precautions against such a cunning adversary.

It’s intriguing to note that Demis Hassabis, CEO of Google’s DeepMind, suggests we may soon reach the significant milestone of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). However, he expresses concern that society might not be fully prepared for all the implications this could bring. He also admitted that these possibilities often cause him sleepless nights.

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2025-07-23 13:09