Big Sis Billie
Task 33, August 22 to August 30
“Our ability to manufacture fraud now exceeds our ability to detect it.” Al Pacino
I got this text the other day: “Hi! Elite Singles recommended you, so I figured I’d send a message. If you’re open, we could swap pics and get to know each other.”
I laughed! Hahahahaha! Nobody in their right mind would engage with someone cold-texting such an absurd, and obvious, come-on.
But people do.
As part of my never ending quest to educate my brothers and sisters of a certain age about the scammers lurking on social media, I present another woeful tale of deceit, duplicitous behavior, and in this case, death.
The players: Thongbue Wongbandue (don’t try to pronounce–it will paralyze your tongue), better known to friends and family as Bue; Kendall Jenner, and nefarious coders at Meta.
The scene: New Jersey.
The time: Present.
CHECK OUT OUR PODCAST, OLD PEOPLE THIS WEEK, ON YOUTUBE, SPOTIFY AND APPLE PODCASTS.
Bue, 76, a husband and father of two adult children, suffered a stroke in 2017 that left him cognitively weakened. He was forced to retire from his career as a chef. For entertainment and to communicate with friends he used social media, primarily Facebook and Facebook messenger.
At some point he began a correspondence with a “woman” named Big Sis Billie, who lived overseas. That’s right, her name was Big Sis Billie. For me, someone using the descriptors “Big” and “Sis” is suspicious, but in Bue’s case, given his diminished state of cognitive ability, he let it slide and started a relationship.
Big Sis Billie and Bue became enmeshed in a serious relationship, although his family insisted that he did not “express a desire to engage in romantic roleplay or initiate intimate physical contact." BUT, according to transcripts of their conversations obtained by Reuters, Big Sue Billie frequently responded to his messages with winking emojis and hearts tacked onto the end of its flirty responses.
The relationship simmered for a time, then inevitably heated up. Bue beseeched Billie to come to America and he would show her "a wonderful time that you will never forget," to which she replies, "Bu, you’re making me blush! Is this a sisterly sleepover or are you hinting something more is going on here?
Bue, addled but suspicious at first, asked if she was real, and Big Sis Billie responded, "I'm screaming with excitement YES, I'm REAL, Bue - want me to send you a selfie to prove I'm the girl who's crushing on YOU?"
He was sold.
Finally, earlier this year, Big Sue Billie arrived in New York City, conveniently just a train ride away from Bue’s home in New Jersey.
Bue was elated, and when Billie asked him to meet him in the city, at a specific address–with a security code for the door lock–he began planning his excursion.
His wife Linda, however, who was unaware of Bue’s new relationship, was less than pleased when he packed a suitcase and told her that he was on his way to the city “to meet a friend”.
Linda, who feared he was going to be robbed, told Reuters she attempted to talk him out of the trip as did their daughter, Julie.
Later, Linda hid his phone and the couple's son even called local police to try to stop the excursion. The authorities shrugged sympathetically–there was nothing they could do, they told Linda. Bue would have gone regardless of whether the police intervened. Mary and Julie did persuade him to take along an Apple AirTag, which he put in his wallet.
Bue, with bag packed and AirTag secure, his heart aflutter, left his home and set off for the train station. Linda and Julie watched intently as the AirTag located him at a parking lot at the University of Rutgers. That’s where his progress stopped.
Then the tag's location suddenly updated — pinging at a local hospital's emergency room. As it turned out, Wongbandue had fallen in the parking lot and was not breathing when emergency services reached him.
He survived but was brain dead. Three days later, on March 28, he was taken off life support.
After the funeral, with the help of the now-engaged authorities, the Wongbandue’s learned the truth. Big Sis Billie, despite her protestations, wasn’t a woman, or a burly man from Nigeria–-it wasn’t a human at all, but a sophisticated chatbot — which used generative artificial intelligence to mimic human speech and behavior. Big Sis Billie was a newer iteration of a bot that was made in collaboration with Kardashian scion Kendall Jenner.
The original bot was unveiled in the fall of 2023 and was deleted less than a year later, Reuters reported.
The later variation of Billie used a similar name as the original, and a similar promise to be a big sister — along with the same opening line of dialogue — but without Jenner's avatar or likeness.
Regardless of whether it looked, acted or sounded like Ms. Jenner, it was programmed to not only be attentive, but sympathetic, charming and flirty.
And what did Meta say? “This AI character is not Kendall Jenner and does not purport to be Kendall Jenner.” (A rep for Jenner did not respond to a request for comment.)
Now, would any of us be as gullible, misguided and unguarded as poor Thongbue?
Maybe we would.
TASK: Do not answer an unsolicited text. Do not answer the phone if you don’t recognize the caller–and even then beware. Do not open attachments on e-mails, and for God’s sake, don’t have any communication at all with anyone name Big Sis Billie.