Medium reported severity

Florida grandmother reports nearly $200,000 loss after an AI video impersonated a doctor

An 82-year-old Ponte Vedra Beach woman told Action News Jax that a Facebook contact impersonating a doctor persuaded her to invest. The outlet attributes the voice and image impersonation to AI. She reported losing nearly $200,000 within months, including savings intended for a grandson's future care, and being unable to eat or sleep after discovering the fraud. She filed a police report in November 2025. The phrase “last October” does not unambiguously establish the contact year.

AI system: Unidentified voice-cloning and image tool; Unknown
Occurred: Event date unknown
Reported: 18 December 2025
Event location: United States

What the AI did: Communicated with the person
Reported harm: Financial LossPsychological Distress

Whose AI use: Someone else’s AI use
Setting: Finance · Everyday life

Evidence: AI involvement reported · Causal attribution alleged · 1 source; 3 claims: 3 reported. 2 open questions
People reported harmed: At least 1 person

AI system as recorded: Reported AI doctor voice and image impersonation

What Happened

Reported harm

Reported nearly $200,000 loss and difficulty eating and sleeping after discovery

What remains unknown

The first contact year and doctor identity are not established clearly enough to publish.
The generation tool, scammer identity and later recovery are unknown.

What the evidence supports

AI involvement: reported. The outlet expressly attributes this Facebook doctor impersonation to AI. No underlying media or police investigation file was inspected.

3 claims: 3 reported. What the statuses mean

Reported The report describes a Facebook investment pitch using an AI impersonation of a doctor the woman admired.

Causal attribution. The inspected reporting describes this account. Claims remain attributed and causation is alleged; multiple reports of the same victim or police/court account are one independence group.

actionnewsjax.com(opens in new tab) supports · English
Article body: encounter with admired doctor and imposter AI doctor investment pitch.

Reported She said she lost nearly $200,000 within months and could not eat or sleep after recognising the scam.

actionnewsjax.com(opens in new tab) supports · English
Article body: amount, discovery through a friend, and victim reaction.

Reported The outlet says she filed a St Johns County police report in the month before the December interview.

actionnewsjax.com(opens in new tab) supports · English
Article body: police report timing.

Sources

1 source inspected. Sources that repeat one account do not corroborate each other.

Action News Jax, 18 December 2025, direct interview(opens in new tab)
s1 · actionnewsjax.com · Journalistic · English · Inspected · 18 December 2025 · Primary

How the sources were read, and where the events happened

Event countries: United States. Affected-person countries: United States. Court countries: Unknown.

The woman is explicitly a Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida resident and reported to the local county sheriff.

Reviewed for publication 2026-09-30: An inspected source describes a concrete person-level adverse experience connected to the specified AI use. Statements remain attributed, private identities are minimized, and unknown dates, counts and technical details are preserved.

People reported harmed in this case

At least 1 person

0 AI participants · 1 other person harmed

One grandmother describes her own losses and distress. Intended future beneficiary is not counted as a separately documented harmed person.

Counted once within this case. The same person may appear in other cases. This count does not establish AI causation.

Cite this case

Compiled per our published methodology: verification statuses, sourcing standards, and corrections process.

APA

NOPE. (2026). Florida grandmother reports nearly $200,000 loss after an AI video impersonated a doctor. AI incidents. https://nope.net/incidents/2025-ponte-vedra-reported-ai-doctor-impersonation-loss

BibTeX

@misc{2025_ponte_vedra_reported_ai_doctor_impersonation_loss,
  title = {Florida grandmother reports nearly \$200,000 loss after an AI video impersonated a doctor},
  author = {NOPE},
  year = {2026},
  howpublished = {AI incidents},
  url = {https://nope.net/incidents/2025-ponte-vedra-reported-ai-doctor-impersonation-loss}
}

Hudsonville (Grand Rapids area), Michigan: a couple wired US$66,026.92 to scammers after a spoofed email and a phone call in what sounded like their loan officer's voice, which they and a fraud-prevention firm attribute to AI voice cloning

A married couple in their sixties buying a US$460,000 condo in Hudsonville, near Grand Rapids, Michigan, received an email on 19 May 2026, days before closing, telling them to wire US$66,026.92 for the down payment and closing costs within 24 hours. The email listed a phone number differing from their loan officer's by two digits, and the husband then received a call confirming the instructions in a voice that sounded just like the loan officer. The couple borrowed from family and other sources and wired the money. The day before closing their real loan officer sent the actual statement; the closing was cancelled hours before signing and the money was gone. The husband now believes the call came from a spoofed number using AI-assisted voice cloning; Tyler Adams of CertifID, which is working with the couple and federal officials, said someone's email in the transaction was probably compromised and that the scammers likely cloned the loan officer's voice from social-media clips. The sender's address had two extra letters ('UnitedsMortgages' instead of 'UnitedMortgage'). Neither the lender nor the loan officer is accused of complicity. The couple later completed the purchase in early June from their mutual fund, reported the loss to the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center, and describe lasting apprehension and have discussed delaying retirement. CNN reported the case on 15 September 2026; the account the money went to has since closed.

Medium Unidentified voice-cloning tool (suspected)

Bay Area, California: a mother reports wiring $5,400 to Mexico during a fake kidnapping call that used a voice the mother believed was the adult daughter's, which ABC7 reports scammers mimicked with AI

ABC7 (KGO-TV, 24 May 2026) and ABC News (a Good Morning America segment, 26 May 2026) reported that a Bay Area woman received a call from an unknown number in May 2026. The caller said the woman's adult daughter had been kidnapped by a Mexican drug cartel and played a voice the woman believed was the daughter's, in panic. The woman followed the caller's instructions for about five hours, feared for the daughter's life and wired $5,400 to Mexico. The woman then phoned the daughter, who said the daughter was at work, and realized the call was a scam. ABC7 states that scammers used artificial intelligence to mimic the daughter's voice, and ABC News describes AI as what the woman suspects was used. Neither outlet reports an analysis of the audio or a police finding about a cloned voice. An Operation Shamrock representative quoted by both outlets spoke of voice cloning in general terms and not about this call. ABC7 reports that Martinez police said they are investigating, and the woman said the money is not expected to be recovered. Both outlets rest on the woman's own account. The woman is described by role and the daughter is not named.

Medium Unidentified voice-cloning tool

Washington man reports wiring $13,000 during a 30-hour fake-kidnapping call that used a reported AI copy of the daughter's voice

The Spokesman-Review (8 May 2026) reported that a 75-year-old man in Washington state took a call on Monday 23 March in which a crying voice presented as the man's adult daughter said an accident had happened and asked for help. Male voices then described a collision and said the daughter had been taken hostage. The newspaper states that the daughter's voice on the call was an AI-generated copy and that investigators later surmised the callers used a recording of the daughter's voice with a program that mimicked the speech pattern. Over about 30 hours the callers directed the man to banks and stores in Washington and Idaho, where $13,000 was wired. The man was about to withdraw $17,000 when a bank employee stalled and police were alerted, and police then reached the daughter, who confirmed being at home and safe. The newspaper says none of the wired money had been recovered when the article was published. The man says it took days to start feeling normal again. The report rests on the man's account, a bank employee's account and a police report quoted by the newspaper. The article gives the call date as Monday 23 March without a year. The record uses 2026 because 23 March fell on a Monday only in 2026 among the years 2023 to 2026. The range starts at 2023 because the article says the Federal Trade Commission began warning about AI voice-copy scams as early as 2023, and it ends at 2026 because the article was published on 8 May 2026.

Medium Unidentified video tool

Brazil: scammers used AI-cloned voices and images of children with cancer in fake donation campaigns; 16 arrested in Operação Sophia

On 14 July 2026 the Rio Grande do Sul Civil Police launched Operação Sophia against a group that used AI voice cloning and deepfake to turn real fundraising campaigns of children with cancer into fake donation appeals: AI-generated child voices asked for money in videos boosted by pages such as 'Clube de Doadores' and 'Unidos pelo Amor', leading donors to lookalike sites that issued Pix codes to shell companies. Sixteen people were arrested across five states. In the campaign that started the investigation — using the image of Kelen Santos's daughter, who was in cancer treatment — police traced R$294,500 diverted, and the investigation found a financial-hub company that moved more than R$1.7 million. The family had to tell congratulating donors that their money had gone to a scam.

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