Deepfake is a visual content that appears to show someone communicating when it’s a montage created by a computer using AI, and it is becoming more common.
A deepfake of Ukrainian President Vlodomyr Zelensky arose during the Ukraine-Russia crisis, asking Ukrainians to lay down their arms and surrender.
Deepfakes have also been used for various other purposes, including financial fraud. For example, in 2020, a bank in Dubai lost $35 million due to a deepfake voice call from one of the bank’s directors.
It’s now a fake video depicting Elon Musk spreading internet havoc and scamming cryptocurrency investors with the get-rich-quick scheme, according to BleepingComputer.
It is now prevalent to exploit celebrities to maximise impact and induce others to engage in an irreversible transaction. Elon Musk is one of the most used celebrities in this issue since his fake Twitter account was used to steal $580,000 in cryptocurrency in just one week in 2021.
Elon Musk’s fake video encourages people to deposit their cryptocurrency on a website called Bitvex to profit up to 30%. Fake Musk claims to have invested $50 million in the platform, and the website even claims Musk is the CEO.
The website also quotes fraudulent statements from Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao and Ark Invest CEO Cathie Wood.
When you arrive at this website, you must register an account to access a dashboard displaying other users’ recent withdrawals from the platform. According to reports, a JavaScript running on the website was assigned to randomise these numbers each time the page refreshed.
According to sources, many YouTube accounts were hacked to promote these videos. So far, only $1,700 in cryptocurrency has been stolen. Let us hope that this figure does not increase further.
