Personally, I find that their samples aren't near anything I'd call "dangerous". I cross-compared the baseline examples to the VALL-E ones when the paper dropped, and found several that were garbled in the usual robotics sounding TTS failures.
Probably a good thing that people are getting alarmed before a true indistinguishable voice cloner exists, though.
I don't think you'd be able to pretend it's a speech given on TV or whatever, but I think they're probably good enough for phishing e.g. the usual scam of pretending to be a stranded family member, but this time rather than texting/WhatsApping them, you can do a live audio call.
Just (like the newspapers used to do to celebrities) try out lots of PIN numbers on random voicemails and lift a message from a family member if you get in. I think given that mobile phone reception isn't always stellar anyway, this would be be very effective.
Layer in a background track of random street noise and prompt the target with deflections "Sorry, the line is really bad; it's breaking up a lot. I can't hear you properly but if you can still here me, can you send me $X".
a real life $5 wrench type solution
> "Dear Fellow Scholars, this is Two Minute Papers.... "
The way. He talks. Is like. He puts. A period. Every. Word. Or two.
So... Like Shatner? Sorry, couldn't resist.
It’s like when Lex Fridman goes on a tangent about love. I just can’t do it lol.
At the rate things are progressing that's about two years away.