Idaho Beware: New Taylor Swift Scam Targets Your Personal Info

The holidays might be over but scammers aren't done trying to rip us all off. This time, it's in the form of none other than Taylor Swift.

Taylor giving away... cookware?

If you're unfamiliar with artificial intelligence (A.I.), you might want to buckle up because things are going to get twisted.

One of the biggest controversies that we're seeing right now with artificial intelligence is its use to replicate the art of others. For example, users are getting creative with its use and have gone as far as to have A.I. create songs by their favorite artists using that artist's voice without their permission.

That's what scammers are doing with Taylor Swift's voice in a viral "ad" promoting a cookware giveaway. In the since-deleted video, Taylor is seen "talking" briefly before cutting to a series of videos of people opening Le Creuset cookware.

"Hey y'all, it's Taylor Swift here and due to a packaging error we can't sell 3,000 Le Creuset cookware sets so I'm giving them away to my loyal fans for free," the ad begins in Taylor's voice.

Seriously - imagine reading this by itself in an email and not in Taylor's voice, you would likely pick up on a scam.

"If you're seeing this ad you can get a free Le Creuset cookware set today," Artificial Taylor says before "reminding" Swifties, "But just a heads up there are a few rules: you must live in the United States and you can only get one per kitchen set per household."

If you're at this point in the video and are a hardcore Swiftie, we could see hear why their guard would be down by this point. The voice does resemble Taylor, but if you pay close attention to the video, you'll see that the audio doesn't match her mouth very well.

"All you have to do is click the button below and answer a few questions. These will only be given out until the end of the day today so don't hesitate. Supplies are running out so get yours while you can. Thank you guys for all your support and I hope you love your new cookware set!"

The cookware brand responds to the scam

While we couldn't find the link anywhere (nor we would want to access it) but according to several reports, the link takes you to what appears to be a legit Food Network site that asks you a series of personal questions.

There's no telling how many people had their personal and bank account info compromised but it was enough for Le Creuset, the cookware brand, to issue a statement on the matter according to Delish.com:

Le Creuset is not involved with Taylor Swift for any consumer giveaway. All approved Le Creuset giveaways or promotions come from the official Le Creuset social accounts. Consumers should always check Le Creuset’s official social accounts and website before clicking on any suspicious ads.

This is just another example of how A.I. and deepfake technology can be used in malicious ways and why we need to continue to do what we can to fact-check any promotions we see online.

We searched through the web hoping to find the video to share with you and it seems like most of them have been taken down (understandably so). The only one we found was publicly reposted by a man named Mike R. on Facebook you can check that out here.

Stay safe out there!