BBC presenter Liz Bonnin has seen her likeness used in an ad campaign without her consent after a company was tricked using AI-generated voice software.
The insect-repellent brand behind the campaign, Incognito, told The Guardian it had been sent a series of faked voice notes by someone claiming to be Bonnin, to all intents and purposes granting them full permission to use her likeness.
Incognito CEO Howard Carter said he was initially approached by a Facebook profile claiming to be Bonnin, having previously sought her endorsement. Despite finding the profile “a bit suspect”, Carter was fooled by a series of voice notes exchanges that “clinched it”.
The scammer provided Carter with a phone number and email address, as well as contact details from someone pretending to be from The Wildlife Trusts – where Bonnin serves as president.
The deal was negotiated via WhatsApp and emails before Carter was sent a contract he believed to have been signed by Bonnin. He then sent £20,000 to an account a few days later.
Within hours of the ad campaign going live, Bonnin posted on X saying that she had at no point consented for her likeness to be used in Incognito’s campaign.
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“At the very beginning it does sound like me but then I sound a bit Australian and then it’s definitely an English woman by the end. It’s all fragmented and there’s no cadence to it,” Bonnin said.
“It does feel like a violation and it’s not a pleasant thing. Thank goodness it was just an insect repellent spray and that I wasn’t supposedly advertising something really horrid!”
The scammer impersonating Bonnin texted Carter the following day to apologise for the confusion, claiming she didn’t control her own social media account, citing security and server issues.
Carter added that the deal didn’t go through Bonnin’s official management agency as the scammer claimed she was doing Incognito “a favour”, provided the deal was done “directly with her”.
An Incognito spokesperson added: “We hope [our CEO] falling for this elaborate scam will be a warning to others not to fall for the same or similar ruses. Sophisticated criminals using AI and other computer-generated communications have targeted Howard and Incognito a few times.”
“Understandably, many companies do not want the public to hear they’ve been deceived because of the embarrassment and shame. As an ethical, transparently-run company, we feel it is our duty to alert people and their businesses about the rise of clever deceptions like this.
“Howard and everybody else in our organisation apologises to Liz Bonnin and her associates for any harm we have inadvertently caused.”
