Older couple loses $18,000 in AI-powered grandparent scam

By Brian Roche

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    FRANKLIN COUNTY, Pennsylvania (WGAL) — The grandparent scam is still circling in the Susquehanna Valley.

One older couple in Chambersburg recently lost thousands of dollars because of a phone call.

Their daughter contacted 8 On Your Side, hoping to spare other families from losing thousands of dollars.

Mary Jo McBride told News 8 her older mother got a phone call from someone claiming to be her grandson, McBride’s son.

He claimed he had gotten into a serious accident and that he had hit a woman who was six months pregnant. He also said he was being charged with a DUI offense and was going to jail.

The call instantly rattled Mary Jo’s 83-year-old mother.

“A man came on the phone and said, he’s going to be fine, but you need to post $9,000,” said Mary Jo.

The caller said an Uber or Lyft driver would come to her mother’s residence at Mennohaven Retirement Community in Chambersburg and take her to the bank.

“One of those services came onto our campus, picked the resident up and took them to their banking institution, where they withdrew the cash,” said Tiffany Rife, an executive director at Mennohaven.

Surveillance cameras caught the driver on camera, and that footage has been sent to police. However, that driver was most likely an unwitting accomplice.

Mary Jo said her mother got an additional call after her first bank visit, saying she needed to go back to the bank and take out an additional $9,000.

This time, both of Mary Jo’s parents went to the bank and withdrew the money.

They lost a total of $18,000.

“I love them that much more for what they did. Really. It just blows my mind,” said Mary Jo about her parents, who thought the money was going to help their grandson.

Artificial intelligence has made this scam much more effective. Scammers track down family members on social media and will often capture the voices of grandchildren through videos posted online. Then, the scammer can recreate the grandchild’s voice using AI to make the call.

Mary Jo says her mother was absolutely convinced she was speaking to her grandson on the phone.

She said her parents were relieved when they got their real grandson on the phone, telling them he wasn’t in jail and was OK.

Chambersburg police are investigating this incident, but McBride says she does not expect her parents to get their money back.

“I don’t want to see anybody else go through this. If my parents — as good as gold as they are — can fall for it, anybody else can,” Mary Jo said.

A key element of this scam is that the scammer posing as the grandchild on the phone begs the grandparents not to tell their parents they are in trouble.

A family code word goes a long way in stopping this scam. If grandparents get this type of call, they ask for the code word, and if the caller posing as the grandchild cannot provide it, they will know they are being scammed.

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