Journalists from Sky News have fallen victim to DeepFake commercials for illegal gambling. In the manipulated videos, the Sky News journalists advertise apps in the Apple App Store, which ultimately hidden illegal online casinos.
Earlier this month, the UK Gambling Commission (UKGC) published an update on new risks in the field of money laundering and terrorism financing. One of the risks that the British regulator mentions by means of AI-Deepfakes, and AI-generated documents with which players can bypass due diligence processes of gambling companies.
The UKGC has required the legal online casinos to train their staff in recognizing AI manipulation. At the same time it has also been shown that players can fall victim to AI manipulation, according to an article by Sky News. Several journalists from Sky News had discovered that they have been abused in Deepfake commercials for illegal gambling.
Video van Sky News
Journalists from Sky News discovered the video on Facebook, where a quarter of a million people had already seen the video. In it the journalists spoke in a news item about important news for all users of an iPhone. The journalist said that an app had been released with users to earn money.
Together with a manipulated version of Apple CEO Tim Cook, the journalists tried to convince viewers to download a mobile app called Heavenly Sphere. In the original video, the Sky News journalists spoke in a news item about a lawsuit against Apple, but the text was manipulated in this video:
“We contacted Olivia, she already won £ 500,000 in a week. Olivia, how could you win such a large amount?
“It’s very simple, I downloaded the app and started playing.”
Sky News-Journalists in a DeepFake advertising
Dr. Siwei Lyu, expert in the field of DeepFake technology, responded to Sky News as follows to the discovery:
“We think these videos were made by editing lip-synced images and combining them with real news scenes. All three faces in the video are lipsynced with the help of AI models.”
Dr. Siwei Lyu
According to Meta’s statistics, the fake advertisements were distributed by dozens of accounts on Facebook, with apps from the Apple App Store being promoted. In the App Store the apps seemed to be on regular apps, but after opening it turned out to be illegal online casinos in the UK.
Sky News immediately informed the British regulator, after which the UKGC intervened by taking the websites of the illegal online casinos offline. In addition, it also contacted Apple to remove the apps from the App Store.
For the UKGC, the discovery of Sky News was a new reason to warn players of illegal gambling at casinos without a permit. On her LinkedIn page, the regulator says that it is financing criminal activities and endangers players. In the fight against illegal gambling, more than 81,000 websites have been removed by search engines in the United Kingdom at the request of the UKGC.
Virgil van Dijk Victim
The leader of the Dutch national team, Virgil van Dijk, has also been used several times in recent years in Deepfake Gameclame of an illegal online casino. In illegal gambling advertising, he praised an undisputed gambling site that focuses on Dutch players. In October 2023, images of the Liverpool defender were also manipulated in a deep fake of an illegal cryptocasino.
Van Dijk was not the only well -known professional football player who had fallen victim to a deep fake. The voice and images of the Belgian star player Kevin De Bruyne were also abused by an illegal gambling site. In addition, illegal online casinos such as No Limit Bet and Zumospin Casino Deepfakes from a NOS Journal broadcast used to lure players to their gambling sites.
