A woman who lost $850,000 to scammers posing as Brad Pitt has faced a wave of online harassment and ridicule.

A French woman who revealed on TV how she lost her life savings to fraudsters posing as Brad Pitt faced a wave of online harassment and ridicule, prompting the withdrawal of an interview on Tuesday.

The woman, named Anna, told TF1’s “Seven to Eight” program that she believed she was having a romantic relationship with the Hollywood star, which led to her divorcing her husband and transferring $850,000.

Fraudsters used fake social media and WhatsApp accounts, as well as artificial intelligence image creation technology, to send Anna what appeared to be selfies and messages from Pitt.

In order to withdraw the money, they claimed that the 61-year-old actor needed money for kidney treatment, and his bank accounts were allegedly frozen. divorce proceedings with ex-wife Angelina Jolie.

Ann, a 53-year-old interior designer with mental health issues, spent a year and a half believing she was in a relationship with Pitt, only to realize she had been duped when news broke about Pitt’s real-life relationship with girlfriend Ines de Ramon.

“This Sunday’s story has resulted in a wave of pressure on the witness,” TF1 presenter Harry Roselmack X wrote in his account on tuesday. “To protect the victims, we decided to remove it from our platforms.”

During the broadcast, the channel said that Anna was suffering from severe depression and was being treated in the hospital.

The interview, in which he was openly photographed and even shared family photos with journalists, went viral on the Internet on Monday.

This prompted a flood of sarcastic comments and jokes, but some online critics accused TF1 of failing to protect a vulnerable individual who was unaware of the consequences of going public.

“Brad told us on Wednesday that he would be at the stadium for the team’s next match,” he said, before Toulouse Football Club retracted the message and issued an apology.

Netflix France too posted on the social network Promoting “four movies with Brad Pitt (really) to see for free.”

Romantic scams has been a feature of the internet since the advent of email, but experts say artificial intelligence is increasing the risk of identity theft, fraud and online fraud.

“These people deserve hell”

Anne told TF1 that she was first contacted by someone posing as Pitt’s mother shortly after she first started using Instagram while on a skiing trip with her family in France.

“He told me his son needed someone like me,” Anne said.

The scammers messaged her again a few days later, this time posing as Pitt.

“At first I told myself it was fake, it was ridiculous,” Anna explained to TF1. “But I wasn’t used to social media and I didn’t really understand what was happening to me.”

“I ask myself why they chose me to do such evil?” he continued. “I never hurt anyone. These people deserve hell.”

More than 64,000 Americans were taken for more than $1 billion romantic scams in 2023 – double the $500 million just four years ago, according to the Federal Trade Commission.

According to the FBI, in 2023, senior citizens were robbed of approximately $3.4 billion in a variety of financial crimes. data. Recently, the agency warned Noting that AI enhances “credibility” or criminal fraud, they “help with content creation and can correct human errors that might otherwise be a warning sign of fraud.”