AI deepfakes have become more prevalent in scamming people after a company in Hong Kong was duped out of HK$200 million (US$25.6 million).
According to police reports, an employee of a multinational company was scammed during a fake conference call with their chief financial officer, ordering them to transfer a huge sum of money.
The employee made a total of 15 secret transactions to five Hong Kong accounts.
Scammers were able to replicate the likenesses of the company's CFO and other executives through publicly available videos. Everyone except the victim was AI-generated in the call.
Hong Kong police have yet to disclose details about the company and the scammed employee while investigations still continue. South China Morning Post first reported the incident.
Deepfake Scams on the Rise
Deepfakes have been under major scrutiny in the past weeks following the AI-generated explicit images of singer Taylor Swift going viral.
The technology, however, has also been getting wide attention for being used in scams and disinformation campaigns across the world.
CBC earlier reported that Canadian celebrities like Michael Bublé and Rick Mercer are being deepfaked to lead unsuspecting victims to bogus links where they are scammed via fake investments.
Many of the scams involved click-bait articles with the personalities' faces featured, telling people how they achieved financial success.
Before the explicit images caught the world's attention, deep fakes of Swift have been going around the internet to promote Le Creuset cookware.
Both Swift and the actual cookware company have nothing to do with the advertisements which were later found to be a widescale online scam on social media platforms.
Authorities have already started investigations on the fraud accounts and websites amid calls to further restrict people's access to deep fake tools.
How to Spot Deepfakes Online
While government officials are still seeking ways to regulate AI use and mitigate its harmful impacts, people are advised to be more careful in accessing dubious links online.
In the case of deepfakes, there are websites online like Is It AI? that use AI tools to detect artificially generated images. The tool is free and can be used by anyone to fight off the increasing number of deepfaked scams.
It is also recommended to always rely on official announcements from legitimate accounts and sites to avoid falling into fraud schemes.
