Scammers Using AI to Impersonate Executives Stole Nearly $3 Million From a California Hospital System
Federal prosecutors said the unidentified hospital system lost $2,968,497 in December 2024. An unsealed indictment describes a worldwide scheme that allegedly defrauded companies of more than $129 million between 2024 and 2026.
By the Bay Area Brief staff · Edited by Seamus McKenna · · 3 min read
California State Capitol in Sacramento on a sunny day. Photo: Mackinacbridge / Wikimedia Commons, CC0 (cropped, resized and color-graded). Archive photo of the area; not a photo of the events in this story.
A California hospital system lost nearly $3 million to an international fraud scheme in which scammers allegedly used advanced artificial intelligence to impersonate corporate executives and attorneys, SFGATE reported.
Federal prosecutors announced Friday that the unidentified hospital system lost $2,968,497 in December 2024 after scammers allegedly impersonated its CEO and an attorney at a major international law firm. An unsealed indictment said the hospital was among companies worldwide defrauded of more than $129 million between 2024 and 2026. Other victims included a Missouri hospital system that lost $4.8 million and a Rhode Island bank that lost $2.7 million, the site reported. Prosecutors have not named the California hospital in the account SFGATE published.
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