Ledger / Feb 2025

Italian defence minister's cloned voice used to solicit tycoons

Strong

Crosetto publicly reported the voice clone and Milan prosecutors opened a fraud case; victim list rests on press.

Callers posing as Defence Minister Guido Crosetto asked wealthy Italians for money to free kidnapped journalists. Crosetto filed a complaint.

“Scammers clone Italian defence minister's voice with AI in ransom scheme”Euronews

Sources

Date: Feb 2025
Disclosed: 10 Feb 2025
Actor: unknown (criminal), as attributed by Euronews
Targets: Italian business leaders (Moratti, Armani, Prada and others)
What the AI did: Deepfake, Fraud, Social engineering
Model: unspecified voice-clone/deepfake tool
Model family: Deepfake / voice
Model basis: unknown
Autonomy: assist
Outcome: Massimo Moratti reportedly sent nearly EUR 1M; Milan prosecutors froze it. Others did not pay.