“It’s quite difficult for me to have to sit in the same room as you”, money saving expert Martin Lewis says as Des Healey, a kitchen fitter from Brighton, walked into the BBC Radio 5 Live studio.
Like many other people, Des had fallen victim to a scam advert on Facebook which used a deepfake of Martin along with tech billionaire Elon Musk promoting a non-existent bitcoin investment scheme.
Facebook owner Meta, recently announced they would be introducing facial recognition technology to try and crack down on scammers who fraudulently used celebrities in adverts.
Martin says he has the “weird accolade” of being the most scammed face in Britain.
“I’ve spent my entire career trying to help consumers, and these criminals, thieves, organised crime people have perverted my reputation,” he said on his BBC Sounds podcast.
Martin tells Des how hard it is to meet somebody who has been taken in by the scam using his image, knowing they “trusted what I was doing” to put the money in – ultimately costing Des £76,000.
It was August 2023 and Des had been on Facebook when he spotted the fake advert for the investment scheme, falsely claimed to be fronted by the duo.
Artificial intelligence (AI) had been used to manipulate Martin’s real voice to make it look like he was doing a TV interview from his house, endorsing an investment scheme by Musk.
“I have witnessed you a few times on TV stating that you never put your name to these things,” Des tells Martin, “so why on that particular day it sold it to me, I do not know… I really don’t”.
‘Falling for scams doesn’t make you a mug’
As a self-employed tradesperson, Des says he saw the advert as an opportunity to “earn a few extra bob” before Christmas in a short period of time while his own business wasn’t busy.
After replying to the advert with his contact details, Des was phoned within 10 minutes and put in touch with a man who claimed to have over 20 years’ experience as a financial adviser.
Calling himself Carl, he set up an account for Des with Revolut, an e-money firm which has nine million customers in the UK, and took a £1,000 investment.
Des was told by Carl “profitable months” were coming up and they would “earn a hell of a lot more” if they invested his money “as soon as we can”.
Shortly after the initial investment, it appeared that Des had the money returned to his Revolut account, although it is unclear if the screen Des was seeing was in fact that account or a fake page, controlled by the scammer.
Trusting Carl, Des then transferred £5,000 into the Revolut account, which was the entirety of his life savings.
“To get the £5,000 back, you had to invest £10,000,” Des explains, “I wasn’t allowed to withdraw anything until the day that he tells me I can”.
The £5,000 Des transferred was then moved out of the Revolut account by the scammer under the guise that it was being invested.
Des HealeyDes ultimately ended up taking out four loans with four separate providers totalling £70,000 in order to keep investing.
It was then when his son listened to one of the phone calls with Carl and raised concerns after hearing music in the background.
He recalls his son asking: “What bank or call centre would be playing a rap song?” before warning his dad to go to the police after suspecting “this isn’t right”.
Reflecting on how he became victim of a scam, Des says it were as if a “spell was cast upon me”.
Martin says Des is “brave and admirable” for speaking out and telling his story as “a warning flag” for others.
He adds that scammers are “psychologically adept at manipulating us, use huge online and intellectual resources in order to steal our money… falling for scams does not make you a mug – makes you a victim, but it doesn’t make you a mug”.
Offering his tips for avoiding becoming a victim of a scam, Martin says beware of “urgency”.
“The more urgent and the less people you can tell – the more secret, the more likely it is to be a scam,” he says.
Another tip is if you’re cold-called by somebody from your bank or a company you deal with, asking for information, “hang up politely” and call them back.
“I would preferably call back on a different phone, just in case they’re keeping the dial number on,” Martin advises.
- If you have been affected by the issues raised in this story help and support is available via BBC Action Line
He says “if you don’t have another phone, you could wait 10 or 15 minutes or call a family member first”.
His adds that people should “be very careful” when being asked to click on a link “or if you receive a text asking you to reply ‘stop’.
“You have to be aware that by sending stop, you’ve just notified them that you’re a real mobile phone number and you could get more scams on the back,” he says.
Since reporting the scam to the police, two of the banks Des took out money with have cancelled his loans with them.
He still owes £20,000 plus interest of almost £6,000 to two separate companies and is in the process of speaking to the financial ombudsman about the options available to him.
Having finally met Martin, and told his story of being scammed, Des says he’s grateful to have had the opportunity as “Martin is a good guy”.
“[He] said after the podcast that I have probably helped a lot of people… I was very pleased I [spoke out].”
A spokesperson for Revolut said it was sorry to hear about any instance where “customers are targeted by ruthless and highly sophisticated criminals”.
The statement added: “Revolut works hard and invests heavily to protect our customers as best we can through our fraud prevention technologies, analysing over half a billion transactions a month.”
