Incident 717: Fake AI-Generated Law Firms Sent Fake DMCA Notices to Increase SEO

Description: In March 2024, fake law firms using AI-generated identities sent fraudulent DMCA takedown notices to website owners, demanding backlinks for SEO gains. These AI-generated law firms, like "Commonwealth Legal," used GAN models for realistic attorney images and fabricated bios. The scam involved fake legal threats to coerce site owners into adding backlinks, exploiting AI technology for deceptive practices.

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Alleged: Unknown deepfake creators developed an AI system deployed by Unknown scammers and Commonwealth Legal, which harmed Website owners , Website operators and Ernie Smith.

Incident Stats

Incident ID
717
Report Count
1
Incident Date
2024-03-01
Editors
Daniel Atherton

Incident Reports

Fake AI law firms are sending fake DMCA threats to generate fake SEO gains
arstechnica.com · 2024

If you run a personal or hobby website, getting a copyright notice from a law firm about an image on your site can trigger some fast-acting panic. As someone who has paid to settle a news service-licensing issue before, I can empathize with…

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.

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