If the movie star of your dreams said he loved you and needed money, would you give it to him?
Unfortunately, many would. Nearly 70,000 people reported a romance scam to the Federal Trade Commission in 2022, totaling a staggering $1.3 billion lost, with an average loss of $4,400.
In the most recent high-profile example, a French interior decorator identified as “Anne” got scammed out of 830,000 euros (about $865,000) by someone impersonating Brad Pitt and his mother on social networks. Her story was first shared on the French TV program “Seven to Eight” on TF1.
The scam began in 2023, when Anne started using Instagram and was contacted by a person claiming to be Brad Pitt’s mother. “She told me that her son needed someone like me,” Anne explained. The next day, someone claiming to be Brad Pitt started talking to her on social media, and Anne began a 1½-year online relationship with the Pitt impersonator. The faux Pitt sent Anne poems and songs to keep her in thrall.
“I was in love with the man I was chatting to,” Anne reportedly said. “He knew how to speak to a woman.”
Once Anne trusted the Pitt impersonator, the scammer used images generated by artificial intelligence to show Pitt in a hospital to sell the lie that the actor had kidney cancer and needed money for treatment because his divorce from actor Angelina Jolie had frozen his bank accounts.
This lie unfortunately worked, and Anne sent the scammer the money she received in her divorce proceedings.
Following the TV report, people ridiculed Anne’s story online, and it led to TF1 pulling down its original interview. TF1 presenter Harry Roselmack tweeted on his X account: “For the protection of victims, we have decided to withdraw it from our platforms.” It underscores the mistaken belief that many people hold: that this could never happen to them.
You may think you would never be scammed, but it isn’t out of the realm of possibility ― at least statistically ― that you or someone you know is secretly trapped in a romance scam. Here are signs to watch out for, as well as ways to suss out AI-generated images:
