Reputation of hundreds of VC firms & founders is at risk due to this scam operation involving #AI & #deepfake. First-hand experience. Investigation. Evidence. What if your Head of PR was recording hundreds of video calls with your investors, customers and partners to use recordings in a scam operation? Not a theory. A real story I personally witnessed unfold last week. I was approached by the former Head of PR of the big crypto company with 20,000+ LinkedIn connections in senior crypto and tech circles. I met her in person at the conference last year. She reached out to me on Telegram and asked me if she could introduce her client, the CEO of a major investment firm, who is interested in our services. I agreed, she arranged the call and sent the link to something that looked like Microsoft Teams. 📌HOW THEY OPERATE The introduction feels real because everything around it is real. The person approaching you, the reputable VC firm, the people on the call… During the call, I saw the faces of the CEO of that VC firm, his partner and the woman who made the introduction. Real facial expressions, real people. Or, better to say, real video recordings of those two investors or super-flawless deepfakes. I couldn't unmute my microphone, and they told me in the chat they couldn't hear me and asked me to fix the tech issue. The window popped up notifying me about webcam/audio incompatibility, and the code I need to run in ‘Terminal’ on my laptop to fix it. She messaged me on TG asking what was happening. But her facial expression on the call told a different story. After years in business, you unintentionally learn to read people's faces. That code was malware. A downloader script that runs in the background, using multiple redirects to avoid detection, created to access your personal data, passwords and crypto wallets. 📌POTENTIAL DAMAGE TO REPUTATION OF HUNDREDS OF VCs & FOUNDERS Imagine hundreds of respected VCs, founders and speakers being reported as scammers by people who believed they were on a video call with them. The reputational damage to these people, whose faces and voices were recorded without their knowledge or were used in deepfakes, could be catastrophic. And beyond reputation, there could be hundreds (if not thousands) of potential victims whose crypto wallets were drained. 📌Bad actors like these disrupt the reputation of the entire blockchain industry. I have multiple screenshots, code analysis and video recordings as evidence. I am considering reporting this to the relevant authorities. What would you do in my situation? Please share this post to help protect others.