A buyer in Lovington, New Mexico, went to the bank ready to wire money for a tractor they found online, but the deal started to fall apart. The bank details didn’t match, so the bank teller called the seller – Allan Brothers Equipment – and a woman Emily picked up the phone.
She “did not sound right”, the buyer wrote in their report on the BBB Scam Tracker. She “could not speak normally,” and the bank teller told the customer that the voice actually sounded AI-generated.
According to another report just days earlier, someone “hijacked the Google business listing and set up AllanTractor.com and built a farm equipment site with AI pictures and some people had already wired money to the scammers who ran the site.
This is dealer cloning, and it’s growing very fast. The FTC even just posted a warning about it.
Reports Nearly Doubled After ChatGPT Came Out
Victims have filed 1,779 dealer cloning reports with the BBB Scam Tracker since January 2019. The count stayed flat for years, then nearly doubled in 2023 after OpenAI released ChatGPT on November 30th, 2022.
The timing of the spike in dealer cloning lines up almost perfectly with the launch of cheap AI tools, which have made it very easy for scammers to fool consumers.
Monthly Reports Hit A Record In July Of 2026
This chart shows just how fast dealer cloning has risen in the last year. Before 2023, the busiest months for consumers to report dealer cloning scams was 16. But July 2026 set the record with 108 reports and $1.3 million in reported losses.
Victims’ Losses Have Escalated After AI Was Launched
Reported losses follow the same trend as reports. Victims reported $533k in losses in 2019, and that rose to $4.5 million in 2025.
In the first 9 months of 2026 alone, reported dealer cloning losses have already reached $6.6 million.
The largest single loss was reported by a buyer in Las Vegas who wired $389,000 for a 2023 Porsche 911 GT3 listed on a cloned dealer site called Daves Used Auto Sales.
Dealer Cloning Has Grown Faster Than Other Purchase Scams On BBB Scam Tracker
When I looked at dealer cloning as a percent of high dollar purchases, its clear that it’s growing faster and is more damaging to consumers than other purchases.
When looking at BBB scam reports of purchases over $1,000, dealer cloning only made up 1.5% of reports, in 2026 that number has climbed to over 10.3%
Victims Are Starting to Report AI In Their Reports
Consumers are starting to believe that AI is part of the problem and they are finding evidence of it when they realize that they have been scammed.
Prior to 2025, there were zero mentions of AI in dealer cloning reports, but in 2026 that number has increased to 13.
The first one came from an Indiana buyer who asked a seller called “Old Time Tractors” for a photo of the tractor before he wired money. The buyer reported on BBB that the picture “was totally AI” and that the company sign with the name was spelled wrong.
“The tires had different tread, and the lugs were uneven”
An October 7th report says another cloned dealer, “Daygo Motors,” offered an AI-generated Montana title for a 2025 Ford F350 as proof the deal was real.
Tractors, Excavators And Classic Cars Are Top Targets
The earliest reports of these scams were mostly cars, RVs, and boats. But farm equipment has quickly become one of the largest categories.
This makes sense because it is not unusual for heavy equipment to be purchased remotely and delivered to the buyer. Scammers take advantage of this fact and prey on it.
What Buyers Can Check Before Wiring Money
The FTC provided some recent guidance to buyers. They advise buyers to visit the dealer in person or to hire a mobile inspection service.
They also advise consumers to search for the dealers name online and use additional terms like “scam” or “complaint”.
The report from the FTC also recommends another test – a live video call. Buyers who asked for a live video call with the vehicle were turned down again and again.
A Pennsylvania shopper asked Braston Machinery Hub for a live video of a nearly new Bobcat skid steer priced at $43,000, and the man on the phone hung up. In California, Big Morty Motors refused to FaceTime about a 1957 Ford Thunderbird and wouldn’t send a video showing the street address.
Some good tips for shoppers to stay safe.
