Ontario Woman Loses $83K to AI Deepfake Investment Scam

Another Canadian has lost tens of thousands of dollars to a scam built entirely around an AI-generated deepfake, adding to a growing pattern of AI-enabled fraud targeting Canadians through social media. An Ontario woman named Friesen lost a total of $83,000 after encountering a deepfake video of Prime Minister Mark Carney promoting a cryptocurrency platform, according to CP24's reporting on her case.

The scam followed a familiar and disturbingly effective playbook. Friesen's initial investment of $13,000 came after seeing the fabricated Carney video, which CTV News independently confirmed circulating on social media, promising fast, risk-free returns. What made this scam particularly effective wasn't just the deepfake itself. It was the follow-up. Friesen was later contacted by someone who called her every day for months, building trust before ever asking for more money. "He had me convinced by then he was legitimate. He talked to me like he was my best friend," she said. She was ultimately convinced to invest another $70,000 before the scammer vanished. "He came on WhatsApp and spoke with me, then disappeared," Friesen said. "I just fell apart. I couldn't stop crying."

Friesen's case is not isolated. CTV News recently reported on another Ontario senior, 86-year-old Judy Skene of Sault Ste. Marie, who lost approximately $900,000 to a nearly identical scam built around a deepfake Carney video promising investment returns "backed by the Bank of Canada." Skene ultimately mortgaged her condominium for $300,000 to keep funding the fraudulent account before all contact with the scammers stopped.

AI expert and media consultant Mohit Rajhans of Think Start Inc. has argued that social media platforms bear real responsibility for hosting this content. "Let's remember they are making money off of these scams. These ads are running on social media platforms; this is a revenue stream for these apps," Rajhans told CTV News. The Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre reported more than $704 million in fraud losses across more than 112,000 reports in 2025, a scale that underscores how significant AI-enabled fraud has become as a national problem, not an occasional headline.

The Government of Canada acknowledged the scale of the problem directly in a statement to CTV News, saying criminals are "increasingly using AI-generated deepfakes and impersonation scams to deceive Canadians, including by falsely depicting public figures to promote fraudulent investment schemes." The statement noted the government has introduced legislation intended to give Canadians stronger protections and greater control over their personal information, and said it expects "online platforms and organizations operating in Canada to use emerging technologies responsibly."

Anyone who believes they've been targeted by a similar investment scam is advised to contact their financial institution immediately, report the incident to local police, and file a report with the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre, guidance worth understanding alongside our broader explainer on AI hallucinations and misinformation risks more generally.

I've advised companies on AI adoption for four years, and this case, alongside Skene's much larger loss, is a sobering reminder that AI's misuse potential isn't abstract or futuristic. It's actively costing real Canadians their life savings right now, using technology that's become trivially accessible. For businesses in fintech, banking, and social media, this represents a genuine trust and liability challenge. Financial institutions need fraud detection systems specifically tuned to catch patterns associated with deepfake-driven investment scams, and platforms hosting paid advertising need meaningfully stronger verification processes before running ads featuring public figures.

Watch whether Canadian regulators move beyond statements of concern toward concrete platform accountability requirements, given that AI expert commentary specifically points to platforms profiting from ad revenue generated by these scams. Also watch whether the scale of losses, now well into the hundreds of millions combined across reported cases, prompts faster movement on the privacy and online safety legislation the government has referenced but not yet fully implemented.