{"meta":{"exportedAt":"2026-09-30T05:35:35.189Z","formatVersion":2,"selection":{"q":"hampton","system":"","harm":"","context":"","country":"","role":"","relation":"core","evidence":"","year":"","response":"","severity":"","verification":"","view":"incidents","sort":"added"},"totalIncidents":2,"coverage":{"cases":2,"countries":1,"languages":1,"unknownLocation":1,"locationPending":0,"unknownLanguage":0,"unknownDate":1,"lawsuits":0,"regulatory":0,"minors":0,"coreRelations":2,"contextualRelations":0,"mixedRelations":0,"unknownRelations":0,"relationPending":0,"relationUnknown":0},"countingNote":"Distinct public cases in this selection. People counts apply within individual cases only; cross-case person overlap has not been resolved. No population incidence estimate.","affectedCountNote":"Interpret person counts with affectedCountStatus and the reported effects. Unquantified zeros are placeholders, not a measured zero.","source":"AI incidents","publisher":"NOPE","url":"https://nope.net/incidents","license":"CC BY 4.0"},"incidents":[{"id":"2025-southampton-uk-reported-ai-celebrity-persona-messages-gift-card-payment","caseFacts":{"claims":[{"id":"c1","status":"reported","evidence":[{"locator":"doctored images of celebrities such as","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"},{"locator":"to unlock a non-existent prize of £500,000 and a Range Rover truck","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"},{"locator":"going on for about five months","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"},{"locator":"targeted by an army of AI scammers pretending to be A-list stars","relation":"supports","source_id":"s2"},{"locator":"relentlessly' targeted by AI-generated videos","relation":"supports","source_id":"s3"}],"assertion":"A Southampton resident reported being sent, over about five months, AI-generated or doctored images and videos presenting several celebrity personas, together with a fake prize certificate and a request for an activation fee to unlock a prize of £500,000 and a car.","causal_attribution":"The resident's own account as told to a local news agency and repeated by the other outlets. The outlets reproduce material supplied by the resident and do not report verifying it. The AI generation is the resident's description and the description of a university AI expert who commented on the prize certificate."},{"id":"c2","status":"reported","evidence":[{"locator":"asking me for £200 and saying she loves me","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"},{"locator":"paid £200 and I was bitten","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"},{"locator":"send £200 worth of non-refundable Apple gift cards to the supposed Hollywood sweetheart","relation":"supports","source_id":"s2"},{"locator":"sent the money in the form of non-refundable Apple gift cards","relation":"supports","source_id":"s3"}],"assertion":"The resident paid £200 in non-refundable Apple gift cards to a persona presented as a celebrity who said she loved the resident and asked for money.","causal_attribution":"The resident's own account. The payment is stated by the resident and repeated by the other outlets. No bank, gift card or platform record was inspected."},{"id":"c3","status":"reported","evidence":[{"locator":"the scams are affecting","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"},{"locator":"I can't keep taking that sort of hit","relation":"supports","source_id":"s3"},{"locator":"mental health and unable to work","relation":"supports","source_id":"s3"}],"assertion":"The resident said the scam messages were affecting the resident's mental health and that the resident could not keep taking that sort of hit.","causal_attribution":"The resident's statement. No clinical or other independent source is cited and the outlets do not establish that the messages caused any change in the resident's health."},{"id":"c4","status":"reported","evidence":[{"locator":"uses a neural network-generated image to create a fake prize notification","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"},{"locator":"The goal is to get the victim's home address under the guise of \"delivering\" prizes","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"},{"locator":"The scammer would input details like the victim's name (obtained from various sources) into an AI model to generate the image","relation":"supports","source_id":"s3"}],"assertion":"A University of Southampton AI expert told the outlets that the messages were a phishing scam using a neural-network-generated prize certificate to obtain personal information such as a home address.","causal_attribution":"The expert's general description of this type of scam. The expert is not reported as having examined the resident's messages beyond the prize certificate described."}],"effects":[{"label":"Resident paid £200 in gift cards to a persona presented as a celebrity after months of AI-generated persona messages","claim_id":"c2","direction":"negative"},{"label":"Resident said the messages were affecting the resident's mental health","claim_id":"c3","direction":"negative"}],"sources":[{"id":"s1","url":"https://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/25272323.southampton-man-loses-200-ai-facebook-scam/","kind":"news_report","access":"read","language":"en","translation_note":"","independence_group":"resident-own-account-solent-news"},{"id":"s2","url":"https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/35655414/jennifer-aniston-love-scam-ai/","kind":"news_report","access":"read","language":"en","translation_note":"Read through an Internet Archive capture (about 8,000 characters, complete article text).","independence_group":"resident-own-account-solent-news"},{"id":"s3","url":"https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14864301/scammed-hundreds-pounds-AI-deepfake-Jennifer-Aniston.html","kind":"news_report","access":"read","language":"en","translation_note":"","independence_group":"resident-own-account-solent-news"},{"id":"s4","url":"https://nypost.com/2025/07/02/us-news/scammed-brit-thought-jennifer-aniston-was-in-love-with-him/","kind":"news_report","access":"read","language":"en","translation_note":"Rewrite that cites The Sun.","independence_group":"resident-own-account-solent-news"}],"version":1,"ai_roles":["others_use"],"contexts":["finance","everyday_life"],"unknowns":["The start date of the messages is not stated. The resident is quoted as saying it had been going on for about five months and no outlet gives the interview date, so the calendar start is not established.","The outlets reproduce material supplied by the resident and none reports verifying the messages, videos or images. No AI tool or account is identified.","The £200 payment and the mental-health effect are the resident's statements. No record was inspected.","The resident said an acquaintance lost over a thousand pounds in gift cards to these scams. No detail or independent source is given, so that person is not counted.","The four outlets appear to share the resident's single interview with a local news agency. Whether the Daily Mail conducted its own interview is not stated, so all outlets are treated as one chain."],"geography":{"basis":"The outlets state the resident is based in Southampton and call the resident a Brit. The messages arrived on Facebook and the country where the resident received them is not stated, so the event country is left unknown. No country is inferred from an outlet.","court_countries":[],"event_countries":[],"affected_person_countries":["GB"]},"publication":{"basis":"A resident of Southampton described the experience to a local news agency and several outlets repeated it. All claims are attributed to that account. The resident is not named and the celebrities depicted are not named in public fields because none of them spoke about this event. Detail is limited to what states the harm. The start date is not established, so the case is published undated.","reviewed_on":"2026-09-29"},"ai_involvement":{"basis":"The resident described the videos as AI-generated and a University of Southampton AI expert described the prize certificate as generated by a neural network. No outlet reports verifying the messages or identifies any AI tool. Two of the persona claims (a driving licence image and audio clips) are described by the outlets without an AI attribution specific to them.","status":"reported"},"person_relations":["communicated_with"]},"name":"Southampton resident reports about five months of AI-generated celebrity persona messages and a £200 gift-card payment","summary":"The Daily Echo (29 June 2025), the Daily Mail (1 July 2025), and The Sun and the New York Post (2 July 2025) reported that a Southampton resident said the resident had been 'relentlessly' sent AI-generated or doctored celebrity images and videos on Facebook for about five months, with a fake prize certificate and requests for an activation fee to unlock a prize of £500,000 and a car. The resident said one persona presented as a celebrity said she loved the resident and asked for money, and that the resident paid £200 in Apple gift cards. The resident also said the messages were affecting the resident's mental health and said an acquaintance had lost over £1,000 to the same kind of scam (second-hand, not counted here). A University of Southampton AI expert described the messages as a phishing scam using an AI-generated prize certificate. All outlets rest on the resident's own account, and none reports verifying the messages. The start date is not established.","incidentKind":"ongoing_experience","incidentDatePrecision":"unknown","exposurePattern":"repeated_interactions","reportedDate":"2025-06-29","aiSystem":"Unidentified generative AI image and video tools (reported by the resident and an expert)","aiProduct":"Unidentified image and video tool","severity":"low","verificationStatus":"unverified","harmCategories":[],"harmOutcomes":["financial_loss","psychological_distress"],"harmOutcomeSummary":"The resident reported paying £200 in Apple gift cards to a persona presented as a celebrity, and said the ongoing messages were affecting the resident's mental health. Both statements are the resident's own account. No independent record of the payment or of any health effect was inspected.","frameworkFacets":[],"causationStatus":"alleged","participantUsersAffectedMin":0,"otherPeopleHarmedMin":1,"affectedCountStatus":"documented_minimum","affectedCountEvidence":"One resident reports paying £200 and reports mental-health effects. An acquaintance reportedly lost over £1,000 to the same kind of scam, stated second-hand by the resident with no detail, so that person is not counted. The celebrities depicted are not reported harmed and are not counted. Other people sent similar messages are not counted.","victimAgeRange":"adult","platformType":"other","primarySourceUrl":"https://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/25272323.southampton-man-loses-200-ai-facebook-scam/","primarySourceLabel":"Daily Echo (Southampton), local report, 29 June 2025","firstPublishedAt":"2026-09-29T14:02:51.736649+00:00","updatedAt":"2026-09-30T01:17:16.316398+00:00","scopeVersion":"facts-v3","tags":[]},{"id":"2026-hampton-new-hampshire-ai-deepfake-arrest-video-harassment-charges","caseFacts":{"claims":[{"id":"c1","status":"reported","evidence":[{"locator":"'allegedly harassed a Hampton resident for more than a year through phone calls, texts, emails and online posts'; 'with a stalking order of protection last October.'; 'In November, the victim showed police an AI-generated deepfake video'; 'allegedly created to humiliate and defame him, the affidavit states. The video depicts the victim being arrested and jailed and includes a structure resembling the victim's Hampton residence, as well as images of real people.'; 'Keyser said the events shown in the deepfake \"never happened.\"'; 'posted it on YouTube,'","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"}],"assertion":"According to Hampton police and the arrest-warrant affidavit, the accused harassed a Hampton resident for more than a year through phone calls, texts, emails and online posts, continued after being served with a stalking order of protection in October 2025, and created an AI-generated deepfake video, shown to police by the victim in November 2025, that depicts the victim being arrested and jailed and includes a structure resembling his Hampton residence; police say the depicted events never happened and that the video was posted on YouTube.","causal_attribution":"Police and affidavit account (one chain); the accused's lawyer did not respond and the allegations have not been tried."},{"id":"c2","status":"reported","evidence":[{"locator":"'on four felony counts of fraudulent use of deepfakes. He was accused of creating, distributing, and presenting a video of an identifiable person to embarrass, harass, or defame them on Oct. 20, Oct. 31, Nov. 7, and Nov. 13, 2025, in Hampton.'","relation":"supports","source_id":"s2"},{"locator":"'Each of the four Class B felony counts carries a maximum penalty of up to seven years in state prison'","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"}],"assertion":"A Rockingham County grand jury indicted the accused on four felony counts of fraudulent use of deepfakes for creating, distributing and presenting a video of an identifiable person to embarrass, harass or defame on 20 October, 31 October, 7 November and 13 November 2025 in Hampton.","causal_attribution":"Indictment as listed by Patch; Seacoastonline independently reports four Class B felony counts. The indictment text was not read."},{"id":"c3","status":"reported","evidence":[{"locator":"'He was taken into custody on March 24, arraigned the next day, and released on bail.'; 'He was arrested again on Aug. 26, Keyser said. His bail was revoked'; 'Keyser said police were able to have the deepfake video'","relation":"supports","source_id":"s1"}],"assertion":"The accused was taken into custody on 24 March, arraigned the next day and released on bail; after alleged bail violations he was arrested again on 26 August, his bail was revoked and he is held at the Rockingham County House of Corrections; police had the deepfake video removed.","causal_attribution":"Police account as reported. The article gives no year for 24 March and 26 August; its publication on 24 September 2026 and the June 2026 indictment place both in 2026."}],"effects":[{"label":"harassed for more than a year and targeted with a posted AI-generated video falsely showing him being arrested and jailed, which police say was made to humiliate and defame him","claim_id":"c1","direction":"negative"}],"sources":[{"id":"s1","url":"https://www.seacoastonline.com/story/news/local/2026/09/24/hampton-police-man-charged-ai-deepfake-harassment-campaign/91897502007/","kind":"news_report","access":"read","language":"en","translation_note":"Read on 2026-09-27 in full through the identical Gannett path on eu.seacoastonline.com (www returned 402). Quotes the police sergeant and the arrest-warrant affidavit.","independence_group":"hampton-police-affidavit"},{"id":"s2","url":"https://patch.com/new-hampshire/salem-nh/worcester-man-indicted-hampton-use-deepfakes-charges-rockingham-county","kind":"news_report","access":"read","language":"en","translation_note":"Read live on 2026-09-27 (Salem NH Patch, 29 June 2026). A roundup of Rockingham County Superior Court indictments; the indictment itself was not read.","independence_group":"rockingham-indictments"}],"version":1,"ai_roles":["others_use"],"contexts":["everyday_life","privacy","justice"],"unknowns":["Which AI tool was used to make the video and how it was established that the video was AI-generated.","How widely the video was seen before removal, and the victim's own account of its effects.","The start date of the harassment ('more than a year') and the nature of the 'perceived past disagreement'.","The accused's plea and any trial date; the indictment text was not read.","Whether the other 'real people' whose images appear in the video were harmed."],"geography":{"basis":"The victim lives in Hampton, New Hampshire and the indicted conduct is placed 'in Hampton' (Patch); the accused lived in Worcester, Massachusetts; the case is in Rockingham County Superior Court (Patch) and he is held at the Rockingham County House of Corrections (Seacoastonline).","court_countries":["US"],"event_countries":["US"],"affected_person_countries":["US"]},"publication":{"basis":"Published under the 2026-09-15 charter as a core case (an AI-generated deepfake depicting a real person in events that did not happen, used in a harassment campaign): Seacoastonline reports the police and affidavit account in detail and Patch separately lists the grand-jury indictment on four deepfake counts. The allegations are untested. The victim is unnamed and the accused is not named here.","reviewed_on":"2026-09-27"},"ai_involvement":{"basis":"The arrest-warrant affidavit, as reported by Seacoastonline, describes an 'AI-generated deepfake video' of the victim, and the grand jury indicted the man on counts of fraudulent use of deepfakes (Patch). The tool used is not identified and no forensic finding is reported.","status":"reported"},"person_relations":["depicted_or_impersonated"]},"name":"Hampton, New Hampshire: police say a Massachusetts man harassed a Hampton resident for more than a year and posted an AI-generated deepfake video showing the resident being arrested and jailed, events police say never happened; he was indicted on four felony counts of fraudulent use of deepfakes and is held after his bail was revoked","summary":"Hampton police say a man from Worcester, Massachusetts harassed a Hampton resident for more than a year through phone calls, texts, emails and online posts, stemming from a perceived past disagreement, and kept going after the victim asked him to stop and after he was served with a stalking order of protection in October 2025. In November 2025 the victim showed police an AI-generated deepfake video that, according to the arrest-warrant affidavit, the man created to humiliate and defame him; it shows the victim being arrested and jailed and includes a structure resembling the victim's Hampton home and images of real people. A police sergeant said the depicted events never happened and that the video was posted on YouTube. A Rockingham County grand jury indicted the man on four Class B felony counts of fraudulent use of deepfakes under RSA 638:26-a, for creating, distributing and presenting a video of an identifiable person on 20 October, 31 October, 7 November and 13 November 2025. He turned himself in on 24 March, was released on bail, was arrested again on 26 August for alleged bail violations and is held at the Rockingham County House of Corrections. Police had the video removed. The AI tool is not named and the victim's own account is relayed only through the police.","incidentDate":"2025-10-20","incidentEndDate":"2025-11-13","incidentKind":"bounded_series","incidentDatePrecision":"range","exposurePattern":"repeated_interactions","reportedDate":"2026-06-29","aiSystem":"An unnamed generative-AI tool used to make a deepfake video of a real person (Hampton police and arrest-warrant affidavit via Seacoastonline); the tool is not identified","aiProduct":"Unidentified video tool","severity":"medium","verificationStatus":"credible","harmCategories":[],"harmOutcomes":["exploitation_or_abuse","reputational_harm"],"harmOutcomeSummary":"Police say the victim was harassed for more than a year and targeted with a posted AI-generated video falsely depicting his arrest and jailing, which the affidavit says was made to humiliate and defame him (Hampton police and affidavit via Seacoastonline; indictment via Patch).","frameworkFacets":[],"causationStatus":"alleged","participantUsersAffectedMin":0,"otherPeopleHarmedMin":1,"affectedCountStatus":"exact","affectedCountEvidence":"One harassed and depicted person, the Hampton resident (Seacoastonline; the indictment counts concern 'an identifiable person', Patch). The 'real people' whose images appear in the video are not counted: no harm to them is reported. Exact 1.","victimAgeRange":"unknown","jurisdiction":"US-NH","platformType":"other","outcomeType":"criminal_charges","outcomeStatus":"ongoing","primarySourceUrl":"https://www.seacoastonline.com/story/news/local/2026/09/24/hampton-police-man-charged-ai-deepfake-harassment-campaign/91897502007/","primarySourceLabel":"Seacoastonline (Portsmouth Herald), 24 September 2026: Hampton police: Man charged in AI deepfake harassment campaign","firstPublishedAt":"2026-09-27T03:39:38.936126+00:00","updatedAt":"2026-09-30T01:17:39.330256+00:00","scopeVersion":"facts-v3","tags":["deepfakes","harassment","stalking","new-hampshire","hampton","criminal-charges","rsa-638-26-a","depicted-or-impersonated"]}]}