Description: Hong Kong police arrested eight individuals accused of using AI-generated facial composites to open bank accounts with altered ID photos. Of 44 applications, 30 reportedly succeeded after passing online identity checks. The accounts were then allegedly used to apply for loans and make credit card purchases totaling HK$860,000, and to launder over HK$1.2 million in suspected criminal proceeds. Police linked the operation to local triad-affiliated fraud networks.
Editor Notes: See also Incident 921. Timeline notes: Hong Kong police reportedly carried out "a citywide crackdown on scams, cybercrime and money laundering between April 7 and 17." This incident ID uses 04/07/2025 as its date; it was ingested into the AIID on 05/17/2025.
Entities
View all entitiesAlleged: Unknown generative AI developers and Unknown deepfake technology developer developed an AI system deployed by Hong Kong-based triad-affiliated fraud syndicate, which harmed Regulatory and compliance infrastructure , Loan providers targeted through fake identities , Hong Kong retail banks , Hong Kong Police , Hong Kong financial institutions , General public of Hong Kong , Financial institutions conducting remote KYC verification and Credit card issuers.
Alleged implicated AI systems: Unknown generative AI technology and Unknown deepfake technology
Incident Stats
Incident ID
1066
Report Count
1
Incident Date
2025-04-07
Editors
Daniel Atherton
Incident Reports
Reports Timeline
Hong Kong police have arrested eight people accused of running a scam ring that bypassed bank verification checks to open accounts by replacing photos on lost identity cards with deepfakes incorporating fraudsters' facial features.
Senior S…
Variants
A "variant" is an incident that shares the same causative factors, produces similar harms, and involves the same intelligent systems as a known AI incident. Rather than index variants as entirely separate incidents, we list variations of incidents under the first similar incident submitted to the database. Unlike other submission types to the incident database, variants are not required to have reporting in evidence external to the Incident Database. Learn more from the research paper.
