this post was submitted on 17 Jan 2024
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It all started with an online video of what appeared to be Elon Musk promoting a new investment opportunity...

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[–] paddirn 38 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

… video of what appeared to be Elon Musk promoting a new investment opportunity.

I mean, that right there should’ve been their first red flag that something was wrong.

[–] Anticorp 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Why would that be their red flag? Deep fakes fool a lot of people, especially older people who don't even know they exist.

[–] AlecSadler 3 points 10 months ago

Because he's the last person anyone should trust for investment advice.

[–] [email protected] 34 points 10 months ago (1 children)

“I started telling my friends and they were all saying ‘oh, that’s a fraud. Don’t do that.’ But it was so real. I mean, you could see it all online and we checked them out through the better business bureau in England, and their website looked all so legitimate.”

Working with real geniuses here.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I have a friend that fell for a scam. They actually called me up to ask for money for "insurance" on a dog they had never seen and wanted to get. I told them it was a scam and that there was no way I was going to lend them the money. They said goodbye, called somebody else up for money, and got it. In the end they got scammed and didn't get a dog like I told them.

[–] iamericandre 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

This is a huge reason to support adoption over buying pets.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 10 months ago

If someone tells you that they are going to make you a millionaire, it's a scam. If Elon Musk tells you that HE is going to make you a millionaire, you're an idiot. Elon Musk is a billionaire, he doesn't need you to get a line of credit too small to buy him a car.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 10 months ago (1 children)

@veeesix What became of well-established adage that nobody is going to just offer you free money?

The format of the scam has changed a bit, but the fundamentals remain... electronic or old school paper, this should have been obvious as a scam.

Someone, 80 right now, was 50 when commercial internet became popular, & late-30's / early 40's when computers came to workplaces. This stuff is decades old, and everyone has had decades to learn.

I feel sorry for this victim, but it was preventable.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Totally preventable. Setting aside tech literacy for even a moment, they fully ignored the warnings their friends gave them and went along anyway.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago (1 children)

FOMO. So many people lost their minds because they "missed out" on the crypto bubble. I'm convinced that's the only reason NFTs even got halfway as far as they did - folks trying to artificially meme up a new gold rush that they could ride

[–] [email protected] 16 points 10 months ago

It’s their own greed that got them in this situation. Fuck these scammers but if they weren’t so goddamn greedy they wouldn’t even be on the lookout for these schemes. Why even take so much risk when you are already retired? That dream home should stay a dream if you can’t afford it already after you retire.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I had likely this very video served to me on Monday by YouTube. It pretended to be and ABC News interview with Elon. It was clearly an AI generated video and matching audio. I reported it to YouTube for all the good that'll do. YouTube should be partially liable for running ads like this on their platform!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Agreed! Anytime I get served a celebrity-endorsed ad I’ll watch the lipsync very carefully.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

lol I usually skip them! But the deepfake ones are the most interesting and give me a chance to exercise that report button.

[–] [email protected] -3 points 10 months ago

Ads are the easiest way to filter for the stupid people. Only the stupidest see them.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I always wonder if when I'm older I'll somehow just lose what seems like common sense to me today.

[–] SendMePhotos 4 points 10 months ago

When life beats your ass time and time again, you don't think with logic, you think with hope.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 10 months ago

“I started telling my friends and they were all saying ‘oh, that’s a fraud. Don’t do that.’ But it was so real. I mean, you could see it all online and we checked them out through the better business bureau in England, and their website looked all so legitimate.”

[–] CultHero 12 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I am very grateful that my 76 year old mother is savvy enough to ask me or my brother if something seems off. If she gets a suspicious email or link or pop up and she's no 100% sure it's fake she asks one of us and we'll check it out.

I'm so glad she's not an easily manipulated boomer like some of them. Not saying boomer bad, just that because a lot of them were already up there before the internet became a thing it's easy for them to take something they see at face value because they don't realize how easy it is to lie on the internet.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 10 months ago (1 children)

That’s a healthy amount of skepticism.

It’ll be a lot harder in the future when AI-generated voices really hit the mainstream and we can’t even tell if our family is actually calling on the other end!

[–] CultHero 4 points 10 months ago

That's where growing up in the 80s comes in handy. Thanks to stranger danger we were taught to use code words to prove if someone was telling the truth that our parents sent them to get us. Now it will be needing to use a code word to prove we're talking to who we think we are.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

@veeesix "Invest" in cryptocurrency... always a scam, guaranteed.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

No matter the investment, don’t invest more than you’re willing to lose.