OAKLAND — Oakland school district officials are warning parents they may receive calls from scammers claiming to have kidnapped their children — and even playing audio in the background of fake pleas for help.
The district has warned the parents not to take these calls seriously, even though in some cases the scammers have known the names of the students. Oakland Unified reported several instances of the scam playing out during the fall semester, including two last week. But the students, invariably, were safely at school.
In all cases, the callers are after money, demanding a ransom from parents in hopes they’ll pay up in a moment of fear.
“Unfortunately, this scam shows the heartlessness of some scammers, and the lengths to which they will go to squeeze money from unsuspecting people,” Sondra Aguilera, the district’s chief academic officer, said in a community email. “This is where being alert and prepared for any possible scenario can help protect families.”
Oakland Unified has advised parents to remember that they’ll hear from the schools themselves if their children ever do go missing, and that students are otherwise “safe and protected” after reaching campus.
“If you receive a call during school hours from someone you don’t know claiming to have your child, copy down their phone number and get any other information about them that you can,” Aguilera said. “Then hang up and call Oakland Police.”
Some families at the Oakland schools said the scammers played the sound of children saying, “Please don’t let them hurt me.”
It’s unclear how convincing the audio might have sounded, but such tactics are increasingly common amid the rise of generative artificial intelligence. Some AI programs need only a snippet of someone’s voice to begin trying to mimic it.
Phone calls or texts from impostors were by far the most prevalent type of scam last year in the U.S., though reported instances of scams declined in 2022 from a 20-year peak the year before, according to data from the Federal Trade Commission.
Last month, an Oakland resident told KTVU that she sent $3,000 to a scammer pretending to be a police officer who threatened her with arrest. Other residents of the city told this news organization that they received similar calls.