{"id":544220,"date":"2026-06-19T22:23:45","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T22:23:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/544220\/"},"modified":"2026-06-19T22:23:45","modified_gmt":"2026-06-19T22:23:45","slug":"a-76-year-old-was-about-to-lose-his-entire-3-million-retirement-to-a-scam-tiaas-ai-caught-it-but-a-human-prevented-disaster","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/544220\/","title":{"rendered":"A 76-year-old was about to lose his entire $3 million retirement to a scam. TIAA\u2019s AI caught it\u2014but a human prevented disaster"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Artificial intelligence has ushered in a new era for scammers. Within seconds, the technology can clone voices<\/a>, generate convincing emails<\/a>, and create realistic deepfakes<\/a> capable of tricking victims into handing over life savings.<\/p>\n

Put simply by TIAA<\/a> CEO Thasunda Brown Duckett<\/a> on an episode of Fortune\u2019s Titans and Disruptors of Industry podcast<\/a>: \u201cThere are so many scams.\u201d<\/p>\n

But the same technology is also helping humans detect suspicious behavior before money disappears. Recently, TIAA flagged an unusual request from a 76-year-old customer attempting to withdraw his entire $3 million retirement portfolio. According to Duckett, the retiree had been targeted by a scammer\u2014but the company\u2019s AI system was first to notice something was off.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was being scammed, but our AI tool flagged it,\u201d she said. A portfolio manager then escalated the out-of-pattern withdrawal to TIAA\u2019s fraud team, which spent hours trying to convince the customer he was being deceived.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first thing is you don\u2019t want to believe you\u2019ve been scammed,\u201d Duckett said. \u201cYou\u2019ve almost been trained to defend the scam.\u201d Eventually, a fraud specialist contacted the man\u2019s daughter, and TIAA stopped the money from moving.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur participant said to us, \u2018You saved my bacon,\u2019\u201d recalled Duckett\u2014who ranked as No. 7 on Fortune\u2019s 2026 Most Powerful Women list<\/a>.<\/p>\n

AI is fueling over 1 million scams a year\u2014reinforcing the need for human workers, according to Duckett <\/p>\n

Even before AI became mainstream, scamming was on the rise.<\/p>\n

Over $20.8 billion was lost to about 1 million cybercrime complaints in 2025 alone, according to the FBI<\/a>\u2014with older adults accounting for the largest number of complaints and total losses. In 2024<\/a>, individuals over 60 years of age lost a staggering $4.8 billion to scams, while those aged 50-59 lost $2.5 billion. In comparison, overall cybercrime losses totaled to just $1 billion in 2015.<\/p>\n

For Duckett, the case of the 76-year-old\u2014and the broader rise in scams\u2014underscores the continued need for humans and technology to work hand in hand to protect assets.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was the intersection of your workplace, which is our people, your culture, and AI, and that to me, is the opportunity,\u201d Duckett said. \u201cAI by itself would not have necessarily protected this person.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe human is not just in the loop, it\u2019s still all about the humans,\u201d she added.\u00a0\u201cIt\u2019s not just the loop, it\u2019s the whole highway.\u201d<\/p>\n

TIAA\u2019s CEO is just as optimistic about the future of work <\/p>\n

Duckett\u2019s outlook on AI also shapes how she thinks about the future of work at a moment when rapid tech advances are fueling anxiety about the labor market. While some graduates have booed mentions of AI<\/a> during commencement speeches and companies have increasingly weaved the technology into restructuring plans<\/a>, Duckett remains optimistic. Contrary to predictions from business leaders like Elon Musk<\/a> that automation could one day render work obsolete, she argues jobs aren\u2019t going anywhere.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t believe we will have a scenario where none of us are working and we\u2019re just enjoying life. I don\u2019t even think we would enjoy life if we\u2019re not working,\u201d Duckett said in conversation with Fortune Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell<\/a>. \u201cWorking comes with dignity, working comes with perfection, purpose, all the things.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like past waves of disruption, Duckett expects some jobs to disappear\u2014but many more to emerge in their place, particularly in areas tied to cybersecurity, fraud prevention, and AI oversight.<\/p>\n

\u201cCyber is a big risk,\u201d she said. \u201cWe will need more people in cyber, we will need more people monitoring, we will need more people analyzing what AI is telling you.\u201d<\/p>\n

Likewise, entry-level jobs<\/a> won\u2019t be immune to changes\u2014but that doesn\u2019t mean they will outright all disappear. In fact, she sees younger workers at an advantage. Digital natives often arrive more comfortable with emerging technologies and can help organizations understand both AI\u2019s potential and its downsides.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur young people have always informed leaders on where the puck is going,\u201d she said. Ignoring the next generation, she added, \u201cwould be a bad play.\u201d<\/p>\n

Above all, Duckett argued workers and leaders alike need to remain flexible<\/p>\n

\u201cAgility is the most important skill set,\u201d she said, pointing to how TIAA is increasingly rethinking jobs around projects, problem-solving, and cross-functional work. AI, she said, offers companies an opportunity to modernize work\u2014but leaders also need to acknowledge the uncertainty many workers feel.<\/p>\n

\u201c[AI] comes with a lot of anxiety, and it comes with a lot of, \u2018What will this mean for me?\u2019\u201d Duckett said. \u201cWe have to be willing to have those open conversations, those honest conversations.\u201d<\/p>\n

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Artificial intelligence has ushered in a new era for scammers. Within seconds, the technology can clone voices, generate…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":544221,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[177],"tags":[79,18,83875,19,17,234,235,233403,72222],"class_list":["post-544220","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-personal-finance","tag-business","tag-eire","tag-human-workers","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-personal-finance","tag-personalfinance","tag-thasunda-brown-duckett","tag-tiaa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116779116586369075","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/544220","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=544220"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/544220\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/544221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=544220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=544220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=544220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}