A grieving son was left from the thousands of pounds to him by his deceased father by DeepFake smellers who used AI to introduce himself as tech billionaire Elon Musk.
John Cairns, 61, Van Huddersfield lost £ 3,250 After seeing a Facebook video who claims Elon Musk, the world's richest man, to be and advised people to invest in a new AI trade platform.
It is amid a whole series of celebrity deeper in Deepfake that brought people from dozens to hundreds of thousands of pounds, with Con artists recently presented themselves as Pierce Brosnan, Brad Pitt and Martin Lewis.
Mr Cairns, a senior contract manager for a cleaning company, saw the advertisement in 2023 and decided to invest part of the money he had received by selling his deceased father.
After handing over his contact details, he spoke by telephone with a 'account manager' who told him to download Metatrader 5, a legitimate trading platform.
He was also coupled to install the Anydesk app, which gives external access to your remote device.
The father of two was then persuaded to transfer money to prove that he could easily absorb it.
'This was all new to me, I had the money there, so I just went for it and made a payment of £ 250 in the bill.
John Cairns (photo), 61, was left of thousands of pounds to him by his deceased father by DeepFake smellers who used AI to pose as tech billionaire Elon Musk
Mr Cairns saw the advertisement in 2023 and decided to invest part of the money he had received by selling his deceased father at home
“Making the minimal investment, I thought,” What was the damage? ” Said Mr. Cairns.
But looking back, Mr Cairns believes that his vulnerable state of mind was used to manipulate him.
“I mourned for my father and they benefited from that. I didn't think right.
'I was wet behind the ears and did this and I just wanted to baptize my finger in the water with these investments and see how it would go. It eventually became a big dip in the water. '
He told how the 'account manager' initially spoke to him through a few trade transactions and told him that he had made a profit of £ 82.
“This went on for a while. I could see the win that I made on the screen. He said if I wanted to make more, I would have to invest more.
“So I transferred another £ 1,490 and I saw the win grow quickly.”
When he was insisted to make a third investment, Mr. Cairns asked to make a withdrawal, just to make sure he could.
“He had no problem with it and said that I could withdraw at any time. I moved in £ 82, which convinced me that the scheme was real and so I deposited another £ 1,510. '
But when Mr. Cairns started to earn more money, the supposed account manager was pushed and refused to have the profit drawn up.
Mr Cairns lost £ 3,250 after seeing a Facebook video who claims to be Elon Musk who advises people to invest £ 250 in a new AI trading platform
When Mr. Cairns started to earn more money, the supposed account manager was pushed and refused to record the profit (file image)
'When my investments had grown to around $ 5,000, I asked if I could withdraw money and continue by using the profit I had made.
“He said that would be a slow way to invest. He wanted me to invest in Tesla, Netflix, Starbucks – to increase my investment.
“He said what I wanted to do, would take me too long to get where I wanted to be.”
It told Mr Cairns that he may have been duped after he had met his daughter for lunch and her about his $ 10,000 win within two months.
“She was a bit skeptical. She searched the company name and saw reviews complaining that they were not being repaid.
“That brought alarm bells for me.”
At that time, Mr Cairns wanted to stop investing immediately, closing his account and receiving his money back.
“I just spelled with answers such as” you can't make recordings while trade is still active. ” I was constantly thrown away, so in the end I took the hit, I took the loss, “he said.
Since then, he has urged others to 'completely ignore' those videos that promote great celebrities that promote investment schemes.
'I would rather have used the money through the right channels and with a good examination and something nice to retire.
'It's a shame because there are people who might have some money and want to see if they can do better for themselves.
'In these times there are many families who will try to try to make a decent life for themselves and their families.
A gallery owner lost her £ 30,000 Nottingham Gallery after he was worn out by a depth of Pierce Brosnan
'They can even use £ 250 of their benefits, thinking that they can earn £ 2,000 in a few months and then be scammed out. '
The 61-year-old called in the help of national fraud helpline lawyers to try to get his money back from Banks Santander and Chase.
National Fraudshulplijn lawyer Fiona Bresnen said: 'With the progress of AI, we unfortunately see more of this kind of deep -fake wang with the help of well -known figures.
'The Elon Musk video is incredibly convincing and we understand that thousands of people have fallen victim to this specific scam.
'It is becoming increasingly difficult for everyone to tell which investments are legitimate.
When it comes to investment options, our first advice is always: if something looks too good to be true, it is probably. '
But Mr Cairns is not the first to be the target of the fombination of Deepfake that hides behind the faces of popular celebrities.
Recently a gallery owner lost her £ 30,000 Nottingham Gallery after he was worn out by a depth of Pierce Brosnan.
Scammers who posed as the Hollywood actor artist artist convinced Simone Simms that Brosnan would show his paintings and meet fans in her long Eaton Gallery.
And last month a French woman from almost £ 700,000 was duped by scammers who occur as Hollywood A-Lister Brad Pitt.
The victim, Anne, shared this week with French media that she had separated a fortune to help with what she believed was that the treatment of cancer was for the film star.
The 53-year-old divorce had received a message on social media from someone who claimed to be the mother's mother before hearing from an account that she thought was Brad Pitt herself.
The scammers used fake-social media accounts, as well as AI-image-creating technology, to send Anne to be what selfies and messages from Pitt seemed to take her until it came to a head last summer.
The victim eventually realized the mistake when she saw that the actor was in fact not in the hospital and was depicted with a new girlfriend.
She was later admitted to hospital with serious depression, but decided to pronounce herself and to increase consciousness.
