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AS AI TECHNOLOGY progresses, increasingly sophisticated scam videos are becoming harder to spot.
Extra fingers, blurred features and unusual accents can give internet users an indication that a video or ad they are watching is a deepfake made using artificial intelligence.
These scams often work by turning real images of people into fake videos, and they have proliferated in recent years.
One recent deepfake video, featuring images of actor Brendan Gleeson, RTÉ newsreader Sharon Tobin, and scientist Luke O’Neill, demonstrates how AI is becoming harder to spot.
It appears that the aim of the scam is to get people to provide their financial information.
While such scams featuring celebrity images are rife on social media, this video, sent to one of our journalists, shows a leap in quality. If the content of their speech wasn’t so suspicious, it could easily be taken as genuine.
The video begins with what appears to be a newscast, with the RTÉ News logo in the top right of the screen.
“The famous Irish actor Brendan Gleeson found himself at the centre of attention on social media after a live on-air scandal that shook the entire country,” Sharon Tobin appears to say to camera.
“He flew at a group of pharmacists with his fists, calling them ‘bandits in white coats’ after they banned the treatment developed by Dr Luke O’Neill”.
But the image and the audio are fake. No broadcast like this ever occurred on RTÉ.
However, aside from the peculiarity of the story, there are no immediately obvious tell-tale signs that the video was an AI fabrication: it looks and sounds like the real Sharon Tobin is delivering the news.
The video then shows Brendan Gleeson giving an interview, where he claims he was considering moving into a nursing home due to chronic pain, until he took a miracle cure made by Luke O’Neill.
Again, the image is convincing, though there are subtle signs that this is a fake video.
The deepfake of Tobin speaks with an unnatural cadence, which is different to her usual tone albeit not out of the ordinary for a newscast. However, when Gleeson displays the similar stilted speech patterns during what appears to be a candid and emotional interview, it sounds eerily robotic.
There is also blurring in the AI footage when Gleeson touches his face with his hand, a sign that the video is manipulated.
The fake video appears to have used footage from an interview published by the Irish Independent last August as the basis of its deepfake. The same background can be seen in both, and Gleeson is dressed and moves in the same way. While Gleeson did discuss serious topics, including death, during the real interview, he did not tout miracle cures.
Finally, the scam video moves on from a clip of ‘Brendan Gleeson’ and shows a segment featuring TCD scientist Luke O’Neill appearing to speak to camera. Again, the voice is convincing, though it speaks in a slightly disjointed rhythm.
There is also some blurring and other distortions in the video, though these alone wouldn’t be evidence that the video was AI-generated, as the footage appears to show O’Neill speaking on an internet video stream recorded with a webcam, in which such distortions are common.
The deepfaked O’Neill touts a cream that “totally eliminates pain” for a list of medical conditions, including arthritis, that he claims has been banned.
The video was posted to Facebook on 6 July to an account with a string of random characters in its name, and whose only previous public post was a cookie recipe in Russian.
The deepfake video has been viewed tens of thousands of times.
The post that shared the video on Facebook links to a URL that is largely a string of seemingly random characters. Clicking on it brings users to what appears at first glance to be the BBC news website.
However, this fake site again tells the story of Brendan Gleeson promoting a banned cure for pain developed by Luke O’Neill, along with claims that “chemical drugs from pharmacies” will harm you more than the conditions they treat.
The dateline of the story is given in Spanish – “3 de Julio 2025” – and a button at the end of the site also contains Spanish text.
When one clicks through the site to order a bottle of the medicine, another link brings the user to a site for a product called Arthro MD+ which, among other things, says that it is endorsed by The Journal. It is not.
The site asks users to enter personal information, including an address, phone number, and credit card information, including the card’s expiry date and CCV.
Unlike legitimate online shops, it does this before the viewer attempts to order any particular product.
That site is advertised on Google. Google’s Ad Transparency Centre shows that variations of the Arthro MD+ brand have been advertised by various users who have verified their identities, all based in Brazil.
Links on the scam site, as well as other ads put on Google by the same users, indicate the Arthro MD+ website is just one in a wider network.
All of the sites in the network appear to sell vitamins, supplements, and treatments under different names and using various spurious claims.
Such scams have been targeting Irish social media users for months.
The Irish Hospital Consultants Association (IHCA), who had warned about this in May, yesterday issued a new alert for fraudulent advertisements circulating on social media platforms in which doctors appear to endorse unauthorised products or services.
The IHCA said “a number of its members” had told them that “their name and image have been used without permission to promote dubious medicines”.
They also warned that using these unauthorised products could pose health risks.
Facebook transparency tools show that many of these pages have multiple admins in Hong Kong, while source code for the scam sites also suggest they are based there.
The Journal has previously debunked hoax ads targeting Irish people featuring deepfake celebrities, including AI-generated videos featuring Michael, O’Leary, as well as an interview between Elon Musk and Irish BBC newsreader Tadhg Enright.
Less sophisticated scam ads debunked by The Journal have featured images of politicians Leo Varadkar, Micheál Martin and Enda Kenny, as well as television presenters such as Pat Kenny, Anne Doyle, Bláthnaid Ní Chofaigh, Maura Derrane, Ryan Tubridy, Colette Fitzpatrick, Ciara Doherty, Brian Dowling, and Alan Hughes.
Images of comedian Dara Ó Brain, political strategist Alastair Campbell on the Late Late Show with Patrick Kielty, a fake interview of Eamon Ryan on the Tommy Tiernan Show, and fake photos of presenter Tommy Bowe being escorted by PSNI officers have also been featured on fake ads debunked by The Journal.
The Journal’s FactCheck is a signatory to the International Fact-Checking Network’s Code of Principles. You can read it here. For information on how FactCheck works, what the verdicts mean, and how you can take part, check out our Reader’s Guide here. You can read about the team of editors and reporters who work on the factchecks here.
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