Scammer uses AI to pose as Brad Pitt, tricks woman into sending $850,000

Facepalm: Not for the first time, someone has been duped into believing they were conversing with a celebrity online and sent them money. The victim in this instance was a 53-year-old French woman, who sent $850,000 to a scammer that used AI-generated content to convince her she was in a relationship with Hollywood star Brad Pitt.

The woman, an interior designer named Anne, was lured in after being messaged by an account that claimed to be run by Pitt's mother, Jane Etta Pitt. The person made contact after Anne shared photos of her ski trip to Tignes on Instagram.

"She told me that her son needed someone like me," Anne said, according to France 24.

Anne said she initially believed the account was a fake, "but I'm not used to social media and I didn't really understand what was happening to me."

A day later, an account claiming to be Brad Pitt sent Anne another message, saying his mother had spoken about her a lot.

The pair struck up an online relationship over the next two years. The scammer sent photos and videos that were likely a mix of AI and simple Photoshop edits – a lot of them are very unconvincing. Requests for money came when the person told Anne she was being sent luxury handbags but needed to pay the customs bill, the first being €9,000 ($9,272).

The scammer, who also sent Anne (almost certainly AI-generated) poetry, eventually created a story about the actor having kidney cancer.

The fake Pitt said he could not access his funds to pay for the cancer treatment due to an ongoing divorce battle with Angelina Jolie, appealing to Anne to help with the costs. They also sent her AI-generated images of Pitt in a hospital bed. Anne agreed to the request and sent a large sum of money.

"There are so few men who write such things. I liked the man I was talking to and he knew how to talk to women," she reportedly told local media.

Eventually, the fake Pitt asked Anne to marry him. She only realized she had been the victim of a scammer after seeing a news story on Pitt's relationship with Ines de Ramon. Anne contacted the authorities but was unable to recover any of the $850,000 she had sent to the scammer.

Advancements in generative AI have made romance scams even more convincing. The fake Pitt in this instance always said he was too busy with work to speak to Anne on the phone, which is a common tactic even though AI can now generate convincing, real-time conversations.

It's reported that Anne suffers from mental health problems and had been hospitalized for severe depression. France 24 noted that the official Netflix France account referenced the case, posting a message that promoted "four films to see with Brad Pitt (really) for free."

In September, five people were arrested in Spain for pretending to be Pitt and persuading two women, via WhatsApp and email messaging, to invest in fake projects.