Parents Urged to Set Family Safe Words

Victims' advocate Terry-Ann Terblanche says families should agree on a private code word to guard against AI voice-cloning scams.

Updated on Nov. 10, 2026 in Home Cleaning

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Victims' advocate Terry-Ann Terblanche urged parents to set a private family safe word to protect children from scams that use AI to clone voices. Criminals can impersonate loved ones using recordings of a person's voice and do not need to know the family personally.

Why it matters

Voice-cloning technology allows criminals to create convincing copies of a relative's voice from existing recordings, making phone impersonation harder to spot. Children are often the most vulnerable targets, so households are being advised to agree on simple verification steps in advance.

The advice is based on guidance from victims' advocate Terry-Ann Terblanche rather than published statistics. The extraction does not include figures on the prevalence of voice-cloning scams.

The players

Terry-Ann Terblanche

Terblanche is a victims' advocate who has urged South African parents to adopt family safe words against AI voice-cloning scams.

The details

Terblanche recommends a private family safe word that is unusual, avoids birthdays, pet names, sports teams and anything shared on social media, and is known to everyone in the household, including children and babysitters. Families should hang up on suspicious calls and contact the person directly on a number they already know, and children should not open the door because they recognise a voice or face on a screen. A safe word is not foolproof, as criminals could obtain it, but children will not get into trouble for questioning a suspicious call.

Home Cleaning Context

Household safety routines such as agreed verification phrases have long been used to protect children, and AI voice-cloning now makes phone impersonation of family members far easier to produce. Families are being asked to add a simple code word to routines that already govern who may open the door.

Agree on a private family safe word that is hard to guess and make sure every household member, including children and babysitters, knows it. When an unexpected caller asks for money or unusual action, hang up and call the person back on a number you already have.

The takeaway

A simple, agreed code word can stop a convincing voice from prompting an unsafe decision. Practising the habit of verifying through a known number helps families stay safe as voice-cloning tools improve.