Binance executive claims scammers made a deepfake of him

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Patrick Hillmann, the chief communications officer at the world's largest digital currency exchange, claims that he was tricked into taking meetings by people pretending to be him.

Hillmann claims that a "sophisticated hacking team" used video footage of interviews and TV appearances to create an artificial intelligence hologram of him. Hillmann says that the fake was refined enough to fool several members of the community.

Hillmann only offers a screen shot of a conversation with an anonymous person who claims to have had a call with him. They impersonated your hologram, Hillmann says.

There have been no confirmed cases of people being impersonated in video calls. Audio deepfakes can be used to impersonate people over the phone, and video deepfakes can be used to impersonate people. It is not known if the technology in its most accessible form is sophisticated enough to impersonate someone during a live call. According to experts, the simplest way to tell if you are talking to a deepfake is to ask the individual to turn their head.

Fear of deepfakes is much more pervasive. European politicians said they were tricked by a video call of a Russian dissident. The incident was the work of Russian hoaxers, who used only makeup and lighting to impersonate their target, according to the report.

On the other hand, the world of cryptocurrencies is a hive of scam activity. These are usually more low-tech, relying on stolen photos and videos to populate fake social media profiles, but given the highly technical communities that followcryptocurrencies, it is not implausible that people might try their hand at a more sophisticated plot. Hillmann is an attractive target for impersonations due to the potentially lucrative proceeds of the scam. Confidence in a scam project or seed information that would turn the market in a desired direction could be boosted by a deep fake of a coin executive.

If we hear back from Hillmann, we will update this story.