The Threat of Al Impersonation | Mike McRoberts | NBR

Added: 2026-05-09

[00:00:00]As a former newsreader, I've had my identity stolen many times over the years to promote everything from laughable weight-loss programs to sham investment schemes. But, even I was surprised by the level of sophistication in a deepfake advertisement that appeared on Meta's Facebook this week.

[00:00:20]After all, I was its face. The teleprompter, the script, even with glasses, everything turned into a blur.

[00:00:27]The appearance is very realistic. And if the studio looks familiar, that's because the AI-manipulated image appears to have been scraped or taken from an NBR video. Fear of making a mistake and ruining [music] a live broadcast in front of the entire country.

[00:00:45]But, then I did what ophthalmologists in New Zealand call the impossible.

[00:00:49]I restored my vision to nearly 100%.

[00:00:54]Another person whose identity was stolen in the production of the deepfake ad is Dr. Divya Sharma.

[00:01:01]So, where are you? There we go.

[00:01:03]Oh gosh, cringe.

[00:01:05]>> [laughter] >> I know exactly what you're thinking right now. You look at me and say, "Another doctor who wants to sell me expensive [music] medicine." I don't blame you. The medical industry, of which I am a part, has betrayed you. My colleagues here in Auckland and across the country prescribe you glasses costing thousands of dollars or send you for laser surgeries you don't need. What did you first think when you saw it? Oh, well, I couldn't believe it because it looked so real. You know, I I genuinely thought it was you.

[00:01:33]And you? [laughter] Until I saw my side and I just went I think after that disbelief was just fear.

[00:01:40]Um I've worked really hard on having a good reputation and I couldn't believe uh the things that was on that script.

[00:01:49]And that is why I felt it was important that I reached out to you and took all my all the other necessary actions um because this is actually a really important in terms of public safety.

[00:01:59]People need to be aware that there is such a thing as a deep fake. These are terminologies that was unknown to me, but now I've had to have a crash course on.

[00:02:10]Uh, one of the reasons why it looks so real was because it's in the right setting. You're you're here at your offices in in Mount Wellington. You uh, you're wearing your scrubs. I mean, how were they able to do this?

[00:02:23]Um, so so firstly, I want to make it a point that patient privacy was not breached at any point during um, during this video.

[00:02:32]But suddenly, I feel the way how they've accessed uh, the videos uh, through my YouTube channel. So, our company has a YouTube channel and we um, tend to record a lot of educational videos for optometrists and colleagues. So, these scammers have taken a clip from my YouTube video, put it through a AI um, tool which has essentially taken aspects of our voice and have manipulated it such that there is uh, factors such as good eye contact and mimicry of our facial movements to make it believable.

[00:03:08]So, this is not just any uh, you know, technology. Um, this is actually manipulating media so that you can no longer use your your normal um, warning signs that this is a scam. So, this is actually looking and targeting the fact it's trying to make things real so that you would believe it. So, these are technologies that people have access to and obviously the scammers found such a easy way to use your face and my face to market this product. So, for the record, you didn't invent this product?

[00:03:46]No. You've never prescribed it to anyone? No, I haven't. You'd never met me before today. Indeed.

[00:03:52]>> And I've >> never been a patient of yours. Correct.

[00:03:56]The scam [music] goes beyond a stolen image. It uses a real doctor's qualifications and reputation to sell a fake treatment [music] to people who may already be worried about losing their sight. I want to ask you about how significant a threat this is to firstly your reputation.

[00:04:17]It's [music] It's It's significant. So, I am a New Zealand trained ophthalmologist. I specialize in treating blinding conditions such as glaucoma and cataracts.

[00:04:28]I have um spent a lot of my time and life getting to this stage. Mhm.

[00:04:35]This is really upsetting for you, isn't it? It is. Yeah.

[00:04:39]How many years did you have to train to to be here? Um quite a bit. Yeah. Sorry.

[00:04:43]Just a The deep fake does not just claim Dr. Perumal invented and endorsed the product.

[00:04:50]>> [music] >> It also makes her appear to attack her own colleagues and peers, describing the medical industry as a cartel and a medical mafia.

[00:05:00]I'm very proud to say that I'm a doctor.

[00:05:03]>> [music] >> Um I'm a New Zealand trained specialist in the areas of glaucoma and cataracts.

[00:05:09]These are blinding conditions.

[00:05:12]And I I'm a person who upholds my ethics of why I am a doctor.

[00:05:18]And part of that pillar of being ethical in medicine is that you have a duty of care to patients.

[00:05:24]So, seeing patients who could potentially be harmed in this manner using my face and your face on our basis of our professional reputation is unacceptable.

[00:05:36]So, what these people are doing what the scammers are doing are using our qualifications, using my name as a doctor to add credibility to their scam.

[00:05:47]Dr. Perumal has gone to great lengths to try and have this advertisement shut down. She's gone to police, [music] she's been to Net Safe, her governing medical bodies. She says the hardest organization to reach has been the one carrying the advertisement, Meta. Thank you for bringing that up.

[00:06:05]I spent so much of time approaching all these different organizations, but the one organization who I felt could make a change here, and who I could report to, actually didn't didn't work. So, I went to Meta. So, Meta has a automated uh automated URL where you can report scams. Unfortunately, in this case, because there is no Facebook URL, despite the fact that the marketing is coming through Facebook, I'm not able to register it as a scam.

[00:06:40]So, this comes to the next terminology that I've now heard of, which is called dark ads. So, this is a form of dark ad.

[00:06:48]Dr. Perumal specializes in glaucoma and cataracts.

[00:06:52]Glaucoma can be a silent thief of sight.

[00:06:55]That makes patients with serious eye conditions especially vulnerable to claims about miracle cures.

[00:07:02]I suddenly we have had some uh patients so uh clients contact us asking us if they can access this medication.

[00:07:10]Um I'll give you an example. I had a lovely elderly female contacting us from Cambridge. Um she was anxious, very desperate, and she had end-stage glaucoma.

[00:07:22]Glaucoma is a condition where the optic nerves, so the cables at the back of your eye, atrophy. They get thinner and thinner and it's a silent thief of sight.

[00:07:32]So, this patient was really desperate.

[00:07:35]She was told that there were no solutions to treat her condition.

[00:07:39]She tried to put a transaction through to get this medication was turned down.

[00:07:44]But because she was so desperate, she looked me up and contacted my private clinics to get hold of this medicine.

[00:07:50]How does that make you feel?

[00:07:53]Awful.

[00:07:54]Mhm.

[00:07:55]You know?

[00:07:56]These patients are so vulnerable and this is part of the big issue. Dr. Perumal says New Zealand doctors aren't [music] allowed to advertise or endorse drugs in the way this ad suggests.

[00:08:07]She says anyone who sees a familiar face or medical specialist promoting a miracle cure online should stop, check the source, and contact [music] the real clinic before entering any credit card details. May is healthy vision month and what I would advocate there, not only should every New Zealander go out there and have their eyesight checked, but I think what's really important here is is ensuring that you have some degree of integrity in medicine when it comes to health information. [music] So, I would say trust the evidence, not the marketing.