She Sent $855,000 To An AI-Generated Brad Pitt After Thinking She Was In A Romantic Relationship With The Hollywood Star
For a year and a half, a 53-year-old interior designer from France known only as “Anne” thought she was in a romantic relationship with Brad Pitt.
Instead, she was conned by an AI-generated version of the Hollywood star and wound up sending $855,000 to the scammer behind the scheme.
Anne recently appeared on the French television channel TF1 to share her story, but the station was forced to pull her interview after she became the target of severe mockery and trolling online.
“The story broadcast this Sunday has resulted in a wave of harassment against the witness. For the protection of victims, we have decided to withdraw it from our platforms,” Harry Roselmack, a TF1 presenter, said on X.
The hoax began after Anne downloaded the Instagram app in February 2023. At the time, she was still married to her ex-husband, a millionaire entrepreneur.
On the social media app, someone posing as Brad Pitt’s mother reached out to Anne and claimed that Brad “needed a woman just like her.” The very next day, an account claiming to be Brad Pitt reached out to Anne, and initially, she was skeptical.
“At first, I said to myself that it was fake, that it’s ridiculous. But I’m not used to social media, and I didn’t really understand what was happening to me,” she recalled.
Anne continued talking to the faux Brad for months. They exchanged messages on various platforms, and she even received fake AI-generated selfies of the actor.
Eventually, the scammer tried to get a bit of money from Anne. The fake Brad stated that he’d wanted to send her some luxury presents but wasn’t able to pay customs fees. This pushed Anne to send the scammer over $9,200.
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“Like a fool, I paid. Every time I doubted him, he managed to dissipate my doubts,” she detailed.
The money requests soon drastically increased when, one day, the scammer told Anne that he had kidney cancer and needed money for treatment. She received various AI-generated photos depicting Brad in a hospital bed.
“I looked those photos up on the internet but couldn’t find them, so I thought that meant he had taken those selfies just for me,” Anne noted.
As for why the fake Brad couldn’t pay, the scammer told Anne that his bank accounts were frozen due to divorce proceedings with Angelina Jolie, his ex-wife.
Despite being a bit weary in the beginning, Anne ultimately transferred $855,000 to the so-called celebrity after getting an email from his supposed “doctor.”
She’d gotten divorced from her ex-husband, and all the money she was awarded from their separation went to the scammer. Anne, who is in cancer remission, thought that she was “maybe saving a man’s life.”
Anne also has a 22-year-old daughter who apparently tried to get her mother to “see reason” for a long time. It took some images in a gossip magazine for Anne to finally realize that she’d been conned.
She came across pictures of the real Brad Pitt with Inès de Ramon, his new girlfriend, and started to become suspicious of the scammer. They actually sent her a fake news report featuring an AI-generated news anchor to quell her concerns.
The anchor supposedly discussed how Brad was in an “exclusive relationship with one special individual who goes by the name of Anne.”
The faux news report satiated her for some time, but when the real Brad made his relationship with Inès official in June 2024, she cut off her relationship with the scammer.
They attempted to get even more money out of her, posing as “Special FBI Agent John Smith.” At that point, Anne finally contacted the police, and an investigation into the scheme is being conducted.
In the wake of the con, Anne lost all her savings and reportedly tried to take her own life three times. She is now living with one of her friends.
“I ask myself why they chose me to do such harm like this. I’ve never harmed anyone,” she stated.
Ever since appearing on TF1, Anne’s story also sparked plenty of conversation online. Individual users, as well as organizations and companies, have begun making jokes at Anne’s expense, which prompted the television channel to pull her interview with its show, “Seven to Eight.”
The real Brad Pitt has seemingly heard about the situation, too. A representative for the actor issued a statement, saying it was “awful that scammers take advantage of fan’s strong connection with celebrities.”
The representative instructed fans not to respond to any unsolicited messages online, “especially from actors who have no social media presence.”
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