How A 77-Yr-Old Retired Lecturer Was Duped Of Over Rs 18 Lakh By Deepfake 'Romance Scammer'

Deepfake Scam: A 77-year-old retired lecturer in Scotland was duped of £17,000 by a romance scammer who used AI-generated videos, fake documents, and a convincing performance to impersonate a woman.

'Romance scams' have grown across the world.

Source : ABPLIVE AI

Deepfake Scam: The Scotland Police is investigating a case of deepfake scam that left a 77-year-old woman poorer by £17,000 (more than Rs 18 lakh in Indian currency). Nikki MacLeod, the victim, reportedly made bank and Paypal transfers, besides sending gift cards, to someone she believed was a real woman and with whom she was having an online relationship.

Nikki told BBC Radio Scotland that she was sent deepfake videos of a woman, and she was completely convinced that the person on the other side was 'Alla Morgan', who managed to scam her.

The elaborate online romance fraud came to light after her bank told her that she had been duped, BBC said in a report. 

Nikki, a retired lecturer from Edinburgh, got in touch with the BBC Radio Scotland's Morning Programme last month. 

"I am not a stupid person but she was able to convince me that she was a real person and we were going to spend our lives together," she was quoted as saying.

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How Nikki MacLeod Got Scammed

Nikki told BBC that she lost her parents during the lockdown, and had been going through a low phase after a long-term relationship ended. She had started speaking to people online to cope with her loneliness, and met 'Alla Morgan' in a chat group there. 

Nikki was told that Alla was an oil rig worker in the North Sea.

According to the BBC report, the person posing as Alla asked her to buy Steam gift cards — typically used for buying video games — so they could keep talking. Nikki was told the cards allowed Alla to use an internet connection on the rig.

Not that the 77-year-old was never sceptical, but she still ended up paying hundreds of pounds.

According to Nikki, she had asked Alla Morgan to come on a live video call but the person on the other side would always refuse, or the video won't work. 

Nikki told BBC she had indeed started to doubt if Alla Morgan was a real person, but she then started getting recorded video messages, in which the scammer would say it was difficult to connect from the oil rig.

"I was totally convinced by it," she was quoted as saying.

One video even managed to show bad weather on the oil rig. 

"This was before she started asking me for all this money," Nikki told BBC.

She shared with BBC Scotland an AI-generated video of the woman claiming to be Alla Morgan, who seemed to have long brown hair and was wearing a grey hooded jumper. The report said the origin of the woman's image was now known, and that it could be that of a real woman who doesn't know her identity has been used in the scam.  

The person in the video also told Nikki that she could visit Scotland if the latter paid her helicopter ride. Nikki was then sent some documents from the company Alla supposedly worked for, and was also contacted by an HR representative. Convinced by the documents, images, and the videos, the retired educator gave them $2,500, which the scammer told her that she would pay back, the BBC report said. 

Nikki was trying to make another such payment to a certain account that supposedly belonged to Alla Morgan, when her bank told her that she had been defrauded.

'With AI, Every Single Thing Can Be Fake'

Quoting the Scotland Police, the BBC report said the fraud was reported in October, and that an investigation is on.

According to the police, the scammers were still trying to contact Nikki, and recently sent her her a newspaper report that claimed Alla Morgan was in a Turkiye jail now and needed more money.

Nikki said on the BBC radio programme that she wanted other people to learn lessons from her experience.

"These scammers don't have any empathy...they are very good at it," she said. 

"The documents looked real, the videos looked real, the bank looked real," she said, adding: "With the introduction of artificial intelligence, every single thing can be fake."

Nikki's only solace so far is around £7,000 — the amount PayPal and her bank have been able to get back out of the total £17,000 that she was duped of. 

In a statement to BBC, a PayPal spokesman said: "Authorised Push Payment (APP) fraud, which includes romance scams, is a threat that has grown across the industry."

PayPal has urged its users to be careful about "unusual payment requests", and "always question uninvited approaches".