AI Scam Models Face 100 Daily Video Calls
▼ Summary
– A young Uzbekistani woman named Angel applies for an “AI face model” job in Cambodia, using her language skills to make deepfake video calls for online scams.
– Industrialized scamming operations in Southeast Asia recruit people globally via Telegram to work as “AI models” or “real face” models for these criminal enterprises.
– These scam centers use AI face-swapping technology to conduct deepfake video calls, often from dedicated “AI rooms,” to deceive victims who request verification.
– Investigators have identified numerous Telegram channels posting job ads for AI models in known scam hubs, with ads demanding excessive work hours and daily video calls.
– The scams, often “pig-butchering” romance or crypto frauds, build fake online relationships to ultimately defraud victims, using stolen or fabricated personas.
For those seeking employment in certain regions, a disturbing new job category has emerged, promising work but delivering exploitation. The rise of “AI face models” represents a sinister evolution in large-scale cybercrime operations, where individuals are recruited to participate in sophisticated romance and investment scams through deepfake video technology. These models sit for hours, their faces digitally replaced in real-time to deceive victims during video calls, providing a veneer of authenticity to criminal schemes.
One applicant, a young woman calling herself Angel, presented her multilingual skills in a recruitment video, stating she had a year of experience as an AI model. Her application, like many others found on encrypted messaging platforms, highlights a global recruitment pool targeting people from Turkey, Russia, Ukraine, and across Asia for work in places like Cambodia. These locations are infamous for sprawling scam compounds that often involve human trafficking, where people are forced to defraud others online. Now, these operations are actively seeking willing participants for this specific technical role, blurring the lines between victim and perpetrator.
Investigators tracking these criminal networks confirm the trend. “In the past year until today, they are also hiring people doing AI modeling,” explains Hieu Minh Ngo, a cybercrime investigator. “They will give you the software so they can swap their face by using AI and they can do romance scams.” Ngo, along with anti-trafficking groups, has identified numerous channels where job postings for “AI models” or “real face models” appear, often linked to cities known as major scam hubs.
This shift leverages advancing artificial intelligence to overcome a key obstacle in long-term scams. Criminals typically create fake online profiles using stolen photos to build relationships with targets, a process often called “pig-butchering” for its method of fattening up victims financially. When a suspicious target requests a video call to verify identity, the scammer’s operation would previously falter. Now, with a live model and real-time face-swapping software, they can proceed. Some criminal compounds have even established dedicated “AI rooms” specifically for making these deceptive video calls.
The job advertisements themselves reveal a grueling and opaque work environment. They demand extreme hours with minimal freedom, rarely disclosing the actual employer or providing direct contact information. One reviewed post, advertising a six-month contract, outlines relentless daily duties: sending photos, making video and voice calls, and creating multimedia messages. The most staggering requirement is an expectation of approximately 100 video calls per day, illustrating the industrialized, high-pressure nature of this fraudulent enterprise. This system not only preys on the scam’s ultimate victims but also on those seeking economic opportunity, drawing them into the machinery of global cybercrime.
(Source: Wired)
