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Incident 1223: Purportedly AI-Generated Deepfake Ads on Facebook Reportedly Impersonate Trump, Musk, Ocasio-Cortez, Warren, Sanders, and Leavitt to Promote Fraudulent Rebates

Description: A Tech Transparency Project investigation identified purportedly AI-generated deepfake ads on Facebook impersonating President Trump, Elon Musk, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, and Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt. The ads allegedly promoted fake $5,000 government rebates and similar scams, reportedly misleading users and generating ad revenue for Meta before removal.
Editor Notes: Timeline note: This incident ID refers to a series of reported deepfake advertisements that began circulating during the summer of 2025. The activity was publicly documented by the Tech Transparency Project on 10/01/2025, which is used here as the canonical incident date. That date represents a lagging indicator for a purportedly months-long cluster composed of multiple discrete deceptive ad events.

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Alleged: Meta , Unknown voice cloning technology developer and Unknown deepfake technology developer developed an AI system deployed by Unknown scammers operating Meta ad accounts , Unknown scammers , Unknown fraudsters , Senior Health Daily USA (advertiser) , RFY News Group (advertiser network) , Relief Eligibility Center (advertiser) , Meta , I Love My Freedom (advertiser) , Health Benefits for Seniors (advertiser) , Hannah Grace (advertiser) , Get Covered Today (advertiser) , Freedom Asset Advocates (advertiser) , End the Wokeness (advertiser) , Asking America (advertiser) and American Relief Programs (scam network), which harmed Public trust , Meta users , Karoline Leavitt , Instagram users , General public , Facebook users , Epistemic integrity , Elon Musk , Elizabeth Warren , Elderly individuals , Donald Trump , Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Alleged implicated AI systems: Unknown voice cloning technology , Unknown deepfake technology , Meta ad targeting algorithm , Meta ad review automation system , Meta ad ranking algorithm , Meta ad library and Meta ad approval pipeline

Incident Stats

Incident ID
1223
Report Count
2
Incident Date
2025-10-01
Editors
Daniel Atherton

Incident Reports

Reports Timeline

+2
Spam and Scams Proliferate in Facebook’s Political Ads
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Spam and Scams Proliferate in Facebook’s Political Ads

Spam and Scams Proliferate in Facebook’s Political Ads

nytimes.com

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Meta Awash in Deepfake Scam Ads

Meta Awash in Deepfake Scam Ads

techtransparencyproject.org

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Spam and Scams Proliferate in Facebook’s Political Ads
nytimes.com · 2025

An ad that appeared in thousands of Facebook feeds this summer featured an altered video of the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, at a regular press briefing. In it, she appeared to say Americans could claim a $5,000 relief che…

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Meta Awash in Deepfake Scam Ads
techtransparencyproject.org · 2025

Key findings from the investigation:

  • TTP identified 63 scam advertisers who have collectively run more than 150,000 political ads on Meta platforms, spending $49 million.
  • The scammers were often among the top political ad spenders on Faceb…

Variants

A "variant" is an AI incident similar to a known case—it has the same causes, harms, and AI system. Instead of listing it separately, we group it under the first reported incident. Unlike other incidents, variants do not need to have been reported outside the AIID. Learn more from the research paper.
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