Mom Sends $5,400 to Cartel After Hearing Daughter's Voice

She Heard Her Daughter’s Voice. It Wasn’t Her Daughter.

Deborah Del Mastro, a California mother, picked up the phone in May 2026 and heard a man say that her daughter had been kidnapped by a Mexican cartel. He demanded $20,000 for her release. Then she heard her daughter’s voice - 37 years old, unmistakable - pleading for help, saying ‘I am so sorry mom, I love you.’

The voice was a fake. Scammers had used artificial intelligence to clone it.

Del Mastro did not know that yet. She spent the next five hours wiring money.

How the Scam Worked

The call followed a now-established pattern in AI voice cloning fraud. Scammers harvest audio - a few seconds from a social media video, a voicemail, a public recording - and use it to generate a replica voice that is nearly indistinguishable from the original.

The caller told Del Mastro the instructions were non-negotiable. She was told to keep moving, keep the line open, and keep sending money from different locations. She followed the directions. She wired $5,400 to Mexico before the caller told her that her daughter would be released at a nearby grocery store.

Del Mastro drove to the grocery store. Her daughter was not there. She called her daughter directly. Her daughter answered from work.

What Made This Scam Work

Del Mastro told ABC7 News that she called her daughter only after she had already sent the money - not before. The five-hour duration of the call, the constant instructions, and the convincing audio of her daughter’s voice kept her from taking that step sooner.

‘I was totally taken by it,’ she told CNN. ‘It sounded exactly like her.’

The FBI has confirmed that AI voice cloning scams are surging. According to the bureau, Americans lost $893 million to AI-related fraud in a recent reporting period, with voice cloning a growing subset of that total. Scammers need as little as three seconds of audio to generate a convincing clone.

The Warning the FBI Is Sending

Following Del Mastro’s case and others like it, the FBI issued a formal warning in June 2026 about the rise of AI voice cloning scams targeting families.

The bureau recommends that families establish a private code word - a phrase known only to close family members - that can be used to verify identity in emergency calls. If a caller cannot say the code word, the call should be terminated immediately.

Additional guidance includes: never transfer money based on a phone call before verifying the situation through a second channel, and never keep the original phone line open while making transfers, as this prevents the target from calling the real person.

What Victims Should Know

Del Mastro’s case is not isolated. Similar calls have targeted parents and grandparents across the country, using AI-cloned voices of children, grandchildren, and other family members.

The scam is especially effective against older adults. A voice that sounds like a loved one in distress triggers one of the most immediate emotional responses a person can have. The urgency of the instruction - ‘don’t hang up, keep moving’ - is designed specifically to prevent the victim from pausing long enough to verify.

Deborah Del Mastro is out $5,400. Her daughter is fine. The people who called her have not been caught.

References: ‘I Was Totally Taken by It’: Victim of AI Voice Cloning Scam Speaks Out | AI Voice Cloning Scams Are on the Rise | California Mom Loses Thousands After Scammers Use AI to Mimic Daughter’s Voice