"Truman Show" scammers are snaring victims in AI-powered simulated realities
"This fraud succeeds because it carefully shapes how people think, feel, and make decisions over time."
In The Truman Show, an eponymous hero gradually wakes up to the grim fact that he is living in a fake, simulated world controlled by a malign television producer.
Now security researchers from Check Point have identified a new type of fraud in which scammers trap their victims in "AI-generated realities" and named it after the hit film.
Instead of stealing people's money using cleverly written malicious code, attackers instead use sophisticated social engineering techniques to lower their targets' defenses.
Victims are first pulled into "tightly controlled" WhatsApp and Telegram groups where AI‑generated “experts” and synthetic peers groom them for weeks and even months before asking them to download an app designed to steal money and personal data.
"This campaign demonstrates how modern fraudsters can industrialize social engineering with large language models, turning what used to be manual 'pig‑butchering' scams into scalable systems that cross languages, regions and platforms," Check Point researchers Nir Horovitz and Yedidya Vachnish wrote.
Pig butchering 2.0
Described as "a CISO's nightmare", the scam starts with a false invitation from a prominent financial firm, promoting a “skyrocketing stock” opportunity with promised returns exceeding 70% and a link to join a WhatsApp group. Approaches take place via email, ads, messaging services and social platforms.
"Regardless of the platform, the objective remained consistent: move the victim from a public or semi-public channel into a private messaging environment, controlled and run by the attackers," Check Point found.
Up to 90 people appear to be members of this group and all speak the victim's language completely fluently - with some even sending DMs as well as commenting publicly as part of a "fake crowd that never disagrees."
Researchers warned: "The group exhibits constant enthusiasm and agreement, with no visible doubt, disagreement or critical discussion. Private chats appear friendly and supportive: answering questions, presenting examples of their alleged profits and encouraging participation.
"This creates the impression of independent confirmation from peers. In reality, this is automated astroturfing, bots simulating one-on-one validation to reinforce trust and reduce hesitation."
People caught up in the Truman Show scam are also shown daily details of successful trades, making a look as if they're making money. But no real time data exists as evidence of these successes and prices often contradict historical market data.
Throughout the scam, victims are told they are collaborating with major financial institutions to lend force his credibility and lower their suspicion.
Know Your Criminal
Finally, people are granted access to what appears to be an "exclusive, institutional-grade AI trading platform," whereupon they are asked to deposit cash or crypto and tricked into handing over personal details such as their ID document via malicious KYC processes.
Worryingly, this scam software is still available and at least one prominent App Store
"AI was a major force multiplier in this campaign — not because it replaced the scam infrastructure, but because it reduced the cost of running high-touch social engineering at scale," Check Point concluded.
"We assess that LLM-assisted automation enabled consistent personas, fluent multilingual messaging, and sustained engagement patterns that would be difficult to maintain with human operators alone.
"This campaign succeeds not because of technical sophistication, but because it carefully shapes how victims think, feel, and make decisions over time."
Unfortunately, similar scams are likely to become much more prevalent because they are cheap, easy to enact and highly adaptable.
"What makes this case especially dangerous is how repeatable it is — the social layer, content, and infrastructure can be rapidly redeployed and scaled across languages, regions, and platforms," Check Point said.
You can read the full research here.
