Deepfake videos hit crypto world! Solana co-founder video surfaces on YouTube, X

Artificial intelligence technology (AI) has grown by leaps and bounds in the last few months, but so has the number of miscreants using it to defraud people. One of the most prominent dangers emerged recently has been deepfake videos. For the unaware, deepfakes are AI-generated videos, images, and audio that are edited or manipulated to make anyone say or do anything that they did not do in real life. Deepfake videos are mostly being used by cybercriminals for illegal purposes. While nations are drafting and amending IT regulations to deal with this threat, malicious threat actors are all out to carry out these illicit activities, and deepfakes have now entered the crypto world too! Solana co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko recently became the latest victim of deepfakes in the crypto world. Know all about it.

Deepfakes in crypto world

According to The Verge report, a video featuring Anatoly Yakovenko, the co-founder of the blockchain platform Solana recently surfaced on YouTube. In the video, Yakovenko can be seen announcing a “historic day” for his company, and even offering a giveaway via a QR code and a website. However, all is not what it seems. In fact, it isn’t Anatoly Yakovenko at all, but a deepfake of the Solana co-founder.

What’s more concerning is that the video was on YouTube for almost a day, clearly avoiding all the monitoring guidelines that YouTube has in place. But it isn’t just YouTube where it appeared. According to one internet user, the video also appeared as an ad on Elon Musk’s X!

Talking about the issue, Austin Federa, head of strategy at the Solana Foundation told The Verge, “There has been a substantial increase in deepfakes and other AI-generated content recently.”

The video has finally been taken down on YouTube after Solana registered a complaint about the same to YouTube. However, it isn’t the first time that a deepfake appeared in the crypto world.

Ripple CEO deepfake

Last month, the crypto community witnessed the rise of a new deepfake featuring Brad Garlinghouse, the CEO of US-based crypto solutions provider Ripple. In the deceptive video that was previously available on YouTube, the Ripple CEO urged people to invest their XRP tokens in a specified deal with a promise to double them. The video also included a QR code that takes unsuspecting victims to a fake website, raising potential financial risks. This is just another example of the rise in XRP scams lately.

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