Deepfakes of Prince William and the UK Prime Minister are pushing investment scams on Facebook and Instagram.
Uncovered by Fenimore Harper Communications, a media research organization, the deepfakes take the form of ads that lead to a phony cryptocurrency platform.[i] According to Fenimore Harper, the equivalent of $27,000 U.S. dollars has been spent on these ads and they have reached more than 890,000 people.
In all, scammers fueled the ads with 14 different currencies as diverse as Columbian Pesos, Thai Bahm, Uruguayan Peso, Bangladeshi Taka, and United Arab Emirates Dirham.
In one of the ads, a fake Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer announces a “national invest platform,” and “to make money on this official platform, all you need is a phone or computer.” Another ad claims that 45 individuals have been specially selected to earn “life-changing money” through a mysterious project.
Another ad features a fake Prince William saying, “I am pleased to announce that I, Prince William, and the entire royal family fully support Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s initiative and his new platform.”
Fenimore Harper says that some of the ads are still running. The organization said that it identified these ads using Meta’s own AI model, Llama 3.1 70B.
Prince William and UK Prime Minister deepfakes lead to a phony investment site
Fenimore Harper’s report then found that some of the ads directed people to a bogus cryptocurrency platform called “Immediate Edge.”
Once on the site, people were asked to provide basic contact info, followed by encouragement to make investments.
Fenimore Cooper found several negative reviews for the platform on Trustpilot, “mostly from victims complaining they lost their money or were hounded by scammers over the phone.”
Many of the links to the bogus platform appear to be dead now, even as some ads still appear to circulate.
As reported by The Independent, a spokesperson for Meta said, “Our systems detected and removed the vast majority of these adverts before this report was published. As part of our ads review process—which can include both automated and human reviews — we have several layers of analysis and detection, both before and after an ad goes live. It is against our policies to run ads that improperly use images of public or political figures for deceptive purposes, and we remove these ads when detected.”[ii]
A sophisticated scam hides behind low-quality deepfakes
A fake ad featuring Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer in Fenimore Harper’s report shows that the deepfakes are low-grade. In their example, the scammers use previously aired footage of the Prime Minister dubbed over with AI voice-cloned audio. As in the case of many cheaper deepfakes, the lip-synching matches poorly.
With that, this scam echoes the Taylor Swift cookware deepfake scam we reported on earlier this year. It also used poorly dubbed AI voice-cloned audio atop clips of previously aired footage.
However, despite the low-quality deepfake, this scam sets itself apart with the way the scammers manipulated Google search results. Given that many people use search to research potential investments, the scammers made sure to give themselves favorable reviews.
According to Fenimore Harper, the scammers used SEO-hacking techniques so that the scammers could “place their own copy in Google’s ‘featured snippets’ … [making the] top result a glowing endorsement for the scam.”
Fenimore Harper says that the scammers further duped Google’s AI overview feature, which summarizes search results. In their example, people must scroll through several results that contain disinformation before they get to a credible source for reviews.
In all, it appears the scammers put extra thought and care into their scam. They did more than bank on a deepfake and a bogus site to lure in victims. They anticipated the next move for many victims, which was to hop on a search engine and see if the opportunity was legit.
Protecting yourself from online investment scams
Scammers have increasingly turned to AI deepfakes of celebrities and other public figures to push their scams. What’s new here is that we have a prime minister and a member of the royal family falling victim to a deepfake as part of the scam.
However, you can steer clear of online investment scams like these, whether they use AI deepfakes or not. Consider the following as apparent “opportunities” crop up online:
Go with a pro.
Working with an accredited financial adviser is always a sound step with any investment you choose to make, as is only investing funds you can afford to lose if the investment falls through.
Watch out for new, untried platforms.
Steer clear of investments that ask you to contribute money directly from one of your own accounts rather than via a reliable, verified platform.
Seek trusted research sources.
As we saw above, the top results in a search might not be the most credible source of info. When researching financial opportunities, look for established, trustworthy sources of review. Consult several sources as well.
Be wary of celebrity and pop culture tie-ins.
Regard any investment based on a pop culture reference like movies, memes, and shows with a highly critical eye. The same goes for public figures. It might very well be a scam built around buzz rather than a legitimate investment, such as it was with the Squid Game cryptocurrency scam we saw in 2021 and the more recent AI deepfake scams featuring a fake Elon Musk promoting bogus investments.
Use online protection software.
AI-powered online protection like you’ll find in our McAfee+ plans sniffs out links to suspicious sites that promote scams and contain malware. Scams like these take you to shady corners of the internet, and our protection will warn you before you tap or click — and block those sites if you tap or click by mistake.
[i] https://www.fenimoreharper.com/research/starmer-disinformation-meta-deepfakes
[ii] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/starmer-prince-william-ai-deepfake-crypto-scam-b2595554.html
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