In June 2025, Swedish police issued a warning regarding a scam campaign where fraudsters used AI-generated deepfake videos of prominent doctors to promote fake health products on social media. Victims were directed to fraudulent websites where they were tricked into providing credit card information, resulting in unauthorized charges and theft of financial data. The campaign, which began in late May 2025, has led to multiple police reports from both the impersonated physicians and defrauded consumers.
A June 2025 Swedish police warning reported that fraudsters used purportedly AI-generated deepfake videos of well-known doctors, including Anders Tegnell and Agnes Wold, in social media ads promoting fake health products. Victims were allegedly lured to fraudulent sites where card details were stolen and large unauthorized charges were made. The scams, which reportedly began in late May 2025, prompted multiple complaints from both impersonated physicians and defrauded consumers.
Risk classification
- Primary risk domain: 4 Malicious actors
- Primary risk subdomain: 4.3 Fraud, scams, and targeted manipulation
Fraudsters used AI-generated deepfakes of well-known doctors to deceive individuals into purchasing fake health products and stealing their credit card information for financial gain.
Additional risk subdomains
- 3.1 False or misleading information: The deepfake videos spread false medical advice, such as encouraging patients to stop taking blood pressure and heart failure medications.
Causal factors
- Entity: Human
- Intent: Intentional
- Timing: Post-deployment
The incident was caused by human fraudsters intentionally deploying AI deepfake generation tools to create deceptive videos for financial gain.
EU AI Act risk tier
- Risk tier: 3 Limited Risk
Limited Risk: The system involves AI-generated content such as deepfakes. According to the definitions, 'AI-generated content such as deepfakes' falls under Limited Risk (Level 3) requiring transparency obligations.
AI system and alleged parties
- AI system: None named
- AI purpose: Deepfake Video Generation; Voice Generation
- Behaviour type: Tool
- Alleged developer: Unknown voice cloning technology developers, Unknown deepfake technology developers
- Alleged deployer: Unknown scammers impersonating Anders Tegnell, Unknown scammers impersonating Agnes Wold, Unknown scammers
- Alleged harmed parties: General public of Sweden, General public, Consumers misled by fraudulent ads, Anders Tegnell, Agnes Wold
Harm severity
Severity ratings are based on this scale.
Highest direct severity in any category: Minor. Severity is scored from Negligible to Catastrophic in each harm category, for harm the reports describe as caused directly or indirectly by the AI system.
- Physical: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
- Infrastructure: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
- Property: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
- Financial: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
- Environmental: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
- Malicious content: direct Minor, indirect Negligible
- Differential treatment: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
- Civil rights: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
- Democracy: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
- Privacy: direct Minor, indirect Negligible
- Psychological: direct Negligible, indirect Minor
- Epistemic: direct Minor, indirect Negligible
- Child sexual exploitation and abuse: direct Negligible, indirect Negligible
Malicious content
Reported: Yes, the report describes AI-generated deepfake videos used for malicious purposes.
Directly caused: Fraudsters created and spread AI-generated videos mimicking real doctors to promote fake health products on social media.
Inferred additional harm: The deepfake videos likely reached thousands of social media users before being flagged or removed.
Privacy
Reported: Yes, the report describes the theft of credit card and personal details.
Directly caused: Victims' credit card details and personal information were stolen through fraudulent websites linked in the ads.
Inferred additional harm: Stolen card and personal details could be used for further identity theft or unauthorized financial transactions.
Psychological
Reported: Yes, the report describes emotional distress experienced by the impersonated doctors and the victims.
Indirectly caused: The impersonated doctors expressed distress, with one stating 'my heart bleeds' for the elderly victims being deceived, and another calling it 'very sad' that false hopes are created.
Inferred additional harm: Victims likely experienced significant distress, anxiety, and feelings of violation upon realizing they were scammed and had their financial details stolen.
Epistemic
Reported: Yes, the report describes AI-driven misinformation regarding medical treatments.
Directly caused: The deepfake videos fabricated medical claims, such as recommending vascular cleaning, deworming, and treatments for diabetes and asthma.
Inferred additional harm: The dissemination of fake medical advice by trusted public figures undermines public trust in legitimate health authorities and medical science.
People affected
- Occurrences reported: 1
- People reportedly harmed: 10
- People reportedly exposed: 100
Potential causes
Management
- Poor Platform Moderation Policy: Social media companies prioritized ad revenue over rigorous safety screening.
Technology
- Convincing AI Video Synthesis: AI tools allowed scammers to clone doctors' visual appearance realistically.
- Convincing AI Voice Cloning: Scammers used AI to clone the familiar voices of trusted public figures.
Data Inputs
- Public Media of Targets: Abundant public videos of doctors provided training data for AI cloning.
Human Factors
- Public Trust in Known Doctors: Victims trusted the AI-generated recommendations due to familiar faces.
- Lack of Digital Literacy: Victims, especially elderly, struggled to identify AI deepfakes.
Process and Methods
- Flawed Ad Screening on Platforms: Social media platforms failed to detect and block AI-generated scam ads.
Regulatory Environment
- Jurisdiction Limitations: Police closed cases because crimes were committed outside Swedish jurisdiction.
- Lack of Deepfake Regulation: Insufficient legal frameworks to prevent malicious deployment of deepfakes.
Information quality
- Classification confidence: High
- Reason for confidence: The reports from the Swedish police and Dagens Nyheter provide clear, consistent details about the scam mechanism, the specific individuals impersonated, the nature of the fake medical advice, and the financial harm caused. There is little ambiguity regarding the role of AI deepfakes in this incident.
- Ambiguities identified: The exact AI tools or platforms used to generate the deepfakes are not specified.
- Alternative interpretations: None. The incident is clearly a financially motivated cyber-enabled fraud campaign using synthetic media.
Fraudsters in Sweden used AI-generated deepfakes of prominent medical figures, including a former state epidemiologist, to run social media scams promoting fake health products and stealing credit card details. While the incident highlights the growing threat of synthetic media in cybercrime, its direct national security impact is minor, representing localized financial fraud rather than a coordinated state-sponsored attack.
- Overall national security impact: Minor
- Scope: Single nation
- Primary target: Sweden
- Alleged perpetrator: Unknown
Threat characteristics
- Imminence: Long-term. The specific campaign has been addressed by public warnings and police investigation closure, representing an ongoing strategic concern regarding deepfake fraud.
- Autonomy: Human-controlled. AI was used as a generation tool by human fraudsters who designed and executed the scam campaign.
- Novelty: Evolved capability. Represents an evolution of existing financial scam techniques, leveraging increasingly accessible and convincing voice and video cloning technologies.
Impact by dimension
- Physical security: Negligible. No physical attacks, critical infrastructure compromise, or actual physical harm was reported in connection with this incident.
- Information security: Minor. Deepfake videos of public health figures were used for financial scams rather than state-sponsored information warfare or strategic intelligence compromise.
- Sovereignty: Negligible. No threat to state authority, electoral systems, or core government operations was identified in this localized criminal scam.
- Economic security: Minor. Localized financial fraud targeting individual consumers credit cards, with no systemic threat to the national financial system or strategic technologies.
- Societal stability: Minor. Impersonation of trusted public health figures could erode public trust, but the incident remains a localized criminal scam with limited impact on overall societal stability.
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