AI incident #1063 · 12 May 2025

Purported AI-Manipulated Videos of Cypriot Officials Circulated in Alleged Investment Fraud

Open on the AI Incident Database 1 news report Snapshot 7 Sep 2026

What happened

Citizens in Cyprus reported being targeted by an alleged investment scam involving purported AI-manipulated videos that appeared to depict government officials endorsing financial platforms. The Cyprus Consumers Association stated that several individuals suffered significant financial losses after being misled by the videos, which circulated via social media and messaging apps. Authorities are investigating, and the association has warned of potential cross-border spread of the scheme.

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News reports (1)

Coverage catalogued by the AI Incident Database. Titles link to the original publisher; the text is not reproduced here.

12 May 2025
Investment scam uses AI videos of Cyprus politicians to defraud public
in-cyprus.philenews.com · Vassos Vassiliou · AIID #5171

Who was involved

Alleged deployer: Scammers
Alleged developer: Deepfake Technology Developers
Alleged harmed party: Haris Georgiades, General Public Of Cyprus, Averof Neofytou

Classification (MIT AI Risk Repository taxonomy)

Risk domain: Malicious Actors & Misuse
Risk subdomain: 4.3 Fraud, scams, and targeted manipulation
Causal entity: Human
Intent: Intentional
Timing: Post-deployment
Harm level: —
Sectors: —
Countries: —

Risk entries describing this failure mode

Entries from the MIT AI Risk Repository coded to subdomain 4.3.

Impersonation/identity theft
"Impersonation/identity theft - Theft of an individual, group or organisation’s identity by a third-party in order to defraud, mock or otherwise harm them."
A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)
IP/copyright loss
"IP/copyright loss - Misuse or abuse of an individual or organisation’s intellectual property, including copyright, trademarks, and patents."
A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)
Dehumanisation/objectification
"Dehumanisation/objectification - Use or misuse of a technology system to depict and/or treat people as not human, less than human, or as objects."
A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)
Defamation/libel/slander
"Defamation/libel/slander - Use of a technology system to create, facilitate or amplify false perception(s) about an individual, group, or organisation."
A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)
Financial and business
"Financial and Business - Use or misuse of a technology system in a manner that damages the financial interests of an individual or group, or which causes strategic, operational, legal or financial harm to a business or...
A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)
Cheating/plagiarism
"Cheating/plagiarism - Use of another person’s or group’s words or ideas without consent and/or acknowledgement."
A Collaborative, Human-Centred Taxonomy of AI, Algorithmic, and Automation Harms (Abercrombie2024)
Cybersecurity
"LLMs may exacerbate cybersecurity risks in various ways (Newman, 2024). Firstly, LLMs may significantly amplify the effectiveness of deceptive operations aimed at tricking people into disclosing sensitive information or...
Foundational Challenges in Assuring Alignment and Safety of Large Language Models (Anwar2024)
Domain-Specific Misuses
"Improvements in LLMs may exert greater pressure to apply LLMs to various domains, such as health and education (Eloundou et al., 2023). Crude efforts to use LLMs in such domains, however, may incur harm and should be di...
Foundational Challenges in Assuring Alignment and Safety of Large Language Models (Anwar2024)

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