UMVA has learned that a shocking wave of deepfake images and videos featuring prominent public figures, including Nigel Farage and Andrew Bailey, has been flooding social media platforms.
The manipulated media, often designed to look like video clips, aims to promote investment schemes that have been described as 'scams'. These fake adverts have been impersonating the Bank of England and other central banks, exploiting the public, especially vulnerable individuals, when they are online.
According to information obtained by UMVA, Andrew Bailey has spoken out against the scammers, urging everyone to stay vigilant and report these scams so that authorities can better root out digital deception and permanently remove the fraudsters responsible.
Nigel Farage also took to social media to express his concern, posting: 'You may have seen some bizarre AI videos on this platform today. Whilst Andrew Bailey and I have our disagreements, I would never take it that far!' Farage and Bailey are not the only public figures being targeted by scammers; many others have also been used to exploit people online.
UMVA can exclusively reveal that cybersecurity experts have identified a 'global, co-ordinated investment scam ecosystem' behind these fake adverts. A spokesman said the network appeared to be linked with Russian-language scammers pursuing 'financially motivated criminal activity'.
Martin Lewis, a well-known consumer advocate, recently shared a heart-wrenching story about a viewer who had lost everything after being scammed into giving money to a company she believed he had endorsed. Lewis wrote: 'She then goes on to explain how she really wanted her flat and she gave more and more money. And she has nothing left to help with her disability.'
In response to the growing concern, Tech Secretary Liz Kendall has vowed to take action, stating: 'I am really worried about these issues where people's faces are being used, AI is using fake images of people, these so-called digital replicas. This is another issue we've already said we are looking at, because people have got to be able to trust what they see.'
