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Thanks to the commonness of spoofing and the ease of generating a synthetic voice, fraudsters are able to lull the vigilance of even the most experienced Internet users. Therefore, Google announced a new function of the Android system, which is to detect calls made by people impersonating family members, friends or colleagues.

Android will gain a function that checks the authenticity of conversations

The new solution is called "False Call Detection" and was developed to address the growing number of frauds using artificial intelligence. Criminals are increasingly no longer limited to spoofing displayed phone numbers and also use voice cloning tools. Thanks to this, the interlocutor may sound almost identical to the person he is impersonating.

According to Google, such a scenario is becoming an increasing threat. The user receives a call from a number saved in contacts and hears the voice of a parent, child, partner or supervisor on the other end. In fact, the conversation is being conducted by a scammer trying to extort money or sensitive information under the pretext of an emergency.

The company indicates that criminals usually combine two technologies. The first one allows you to spoof a phone number and display the name of a trusted contact on the screen. The second uses artificial intelligence models to generate a voice that resembles a specific person. The development of such tools has made it increasingly difficult to recognize a fake interlocutor based solely on voice.

Google wants to counteract this problem with a mechanism resembling digital identity confirmation. When a user receives a call from someone saved in their contacts, the caller's phone sends a signal invisible to users to confirm the authenticity of the call. Verification is performed using encrypted RCS technology.

Failure to provide such confirmation may mean an attempt to impersonate the owner of the number. In such a situation, the recipient's device contacts the real phone assigned to the contact and checks whether it is actually making a call. If the response from the RCS system is negative, Android will display a warning suggesting you end the call immediately.

Google emphasizes that the entire process is automatic and does not require any additional actions on the part of the user. The feature is enabled by default, although it can be disabled in the Phone app settings.

Fake call detection only works when both people are using Android and the Google Phone app. Installation of the Google News and Google Contacts applications is also required. Therefore, the mechanism will not work when connecting to iPhones or devices using other phone applications.

The new feature is expected to be available globally on smartphones with Android 12 and newer later this month. Google will start the rollout with its own Pixel devices. The company also emphasizes that the technology is based on the open RCS standard, so it can also be implemented by other smartphone manufacturers and application developers in the future.