Appearance can't prove origin
What a deepfake is
A deepfake is AI-made or AI-altered media showing a real person saying or doing something they didn't. It might be a whole video generated from scratch, a real video with the face or voice swapped, or a photo edited to change what happened. The tools are widely available, and some can run live during a video call.
How they turn up in scams
Celebrity "endorsements" for investment schemes and crypto giveaways in social media adverts. Fake news clips used to push a story. Video calls where a "senior colleague" asks finance staff to make a payment. Sexually explicit fakes used to humiliate or blackmail. In each case the video exists to make you act or believe something quickly.
Why spotting by eye fails
Older advice said to look for odd blinking, extra fingers, warped text or mismatched lighting. Current tools often leave none of these, and genuine footage can look strange because of compression, filters or a poor camera. A visual oddity is a reason to investigate, never proof. Detector websites give confident-looking percentages that are frequently wrong in both directions, so don't treat their score as a verdict.
The useful questions
Instead of asking "does it look real?", ask "where did this come from, and would this person really say this here?" A celebrity is unlikely to promote an investment through a random advert; a boss is unlikely to need a secret urgent transfer. The next lesson gives a simple routine for checking where an image or video came from.
Have you ever seen a video of a famous person promoting an investment or giveaway? How did you decide whether it was real?