My mother got completely wiped out by a romance scammer, tens of thousands of dollars over >1 year, all via cash dumped into a Bitcoin ATM I believe. AFAIK she's still talking to the "guy", or she was when I broke off contact with her, after I and just about every other loved one, her bank, and the actual **ing FBI have all patiently explained many times the nature of the scam and exactly how we can tell it's a scam (beyond just "you've never met this dude or even had a video call and he's weirdly financially needy for someone who makes so much money") and sent her all sorts of articles and online resources on the topic and she reassured everyone that she recognized she'd been such a fool and would cut off all contact. And no, she wasn't displaying any other symptoms of dementia or Alzheimer's or anything like that that I could recognize.

I don't know if OpenAI/etc keep close enough tabs on usage that they'd be able to identify if they have people abusing their product for these types of scams, but even if they are I'm sure it's just a matter of time before the leaked LLaMA weights or similar are applied for this purpose, if it's not happening already.

Not a clue what's to be done collectively if law enforcement doesn't care beyond the FBI keeping an eye out for "more serious" money laundering stuff (I suspect that's why they actually care as an institution), but I can share a little practical advice that maybe you won't hear elsewhere:

1. If you're substantially financially supporting your parents or whoever else, you're entitled to and need to understand their budget in extreme detail, just like if you were married. They should be able to explain and prove all of their income and all of their expenses, and they should understand that your generosity is not entirely unconditional -- in the same way that you wouldn't be willing to enable, say, a heroin addiction, you also aren't willing to enable literal scams. (And, of course, they should understand why you need this info and what risk you're trying to protect them and yourself against.) This still doesn't protect them fully, since they can e.g. be persuaded to sell their home and send it all off in secret and only tell you about it once it's too late, or just lie and continue sending off small amounts of money over time. But, it helps limit your exposure, and if you're lucky will make them think twice about people they've never met in person soliciting money from them online.

2. If you see a loved one fall for any online scam, that should probably increase your estimation of their ongoing susceptibility to similar scams, even if they seem to "get it" after the fact in that specific case, even if you don't think of them as particularly gullible in general. Perhaps they'll learn and be more careful, or perhaps they won't and you're just learning new information about them that's unlikely to change.

3. Don't underestimate what even simulated love can make people do. My once-good relationship with my mother, who I never would've considered a "bad person" a few years ago and never displayed any antisocial tendencies to me before, was ruined by her repeated and pervasive deception and theft.