Woman falls in love with Elon Musk's deepfake video, looses over INR 40 lakhs

In a strange turn of events, a woman in South Korean was scammed to believe that she was talking to Elon Musk via Instagram and in a video call the billionaire also expressed his love for her. The woman was then scammed to invest over INR 40 lakhs which she lost, as per a report by the Independent.

The woman, who is identified as Jeong Ji-sun , told KBS- a South Korean broadcaster that in 2023 she was added as a friend by Elon Musk on Instagram. And while she doubted it at first, she believed that it was Musk himself after she had a video call with him.

"I experienced something like a dream last year. On July 17 last year, Musk added me as a friend on Instagram. Although I have been a huge fan of Musk after reading his biography, I doubted it at first," Jeong Ji-sun told KBS.

The woman also shared that she fell for him after he expressed his love for her over the video call. Not just this, in their interactions Musk also spoke about his children and about travelling in a helicopter from his Tesla and SpaceX offices, the woman shared. Musk also shared pictures from his workplace with the woman and spoke about meeting Yoon Suk Yeol-- South Korean president in April 2023-- all of which made her believe that she was indeed speaking to the billionaire Elon Musk.

"Musk even said, 'I love you, you know that?' when we made a video call," Jeong Ji-sun further told KBS.

However, all this while it was a deepfake video of Elon Musk that she was interacting with. Through Elon Musk's deepfake video the scammer even convinced the woman to invest $50,000 (roughly INR 40 lakhs) in a bank account, which they claimed to belong to Musk's Korean employees. Through the investment, the scammer- who pretended to be Elon Musk- told the woman that she would become rich-- and that would make him happy as he helped them get money!

The woman told KBS, "He said, 'I'm happy when my fans are getting rich because of me'."

But it was only later when she lost her money that the woman realised that she was scammed.

This is not the first time that deepfake videos of celebrities and famous personalities is doing rounds on social media. In India, actor Ranveer Singh 's deepfake video about his political video recently stirred up a controversy. So much so that the actor has also lodged a complaint against it. In the past, deepfake videos of actresses Alia Bhatt and Rashmika Mandanna have also surfaced on the internet.