A well-known BBC nature presenter has been implicated in a scam where a fake AI-generated program mimicked her voice and allowed her face to be used in an advert.
Liz Bonnin and her management team noticed last week that the presenter of Our changing planet And Arctic From Above stood in front of a poster for insect repellent spray, which neither she nor management had signed.
Further investigation revealed that the voice messages, purportedly from Bonnin, confirming her desire to appear in the ad, were AI-generated.
“It sounds like me at first, but then I sound a bit Australian and by the end it’s definitely an English woman,” Bonnin, who is Irish, told The Guardian, which broke the story. “It’s all fragmented and there’s no cadence to it.”
The Guardian revealed that the company that produced the ad, Incognito, had received a number of voice messages from someone its CEO believed was Bonnin, and that Incognito had previously sought Bonnin’s approval before being contacted by a Facebook profile that assumed her identity. The company paid a bill given to them by the fake Bonnin and her image – now withdrawn – appeared in the ad several days later.
Incognito CEO Howard Carter claimed to The Guardian that he didn’t get the deal signed through Bonnin’s management agency because the person who impersonated her said: “She did us a favor, on the condition that we do it directly with her and her main agency not involved.” Deadline understands that Carter and Bonnin have met several times in the past. Carter confirmed the AI mix-up to Deadline.
The episode shows the dangers of rapidly developing technology. The BBC, for which Bonnin does most of her TV work, has previously said it is working with major tech companies on AI pilots, but has courted controversy over the technology on several occasions, including using AI for Doctor who Promotion.
Last week, UK government intervention in AI was urged by TV producers trade body Pact and actors’ union Equity.
Deadline has reached out to Bonnin’s reps for comment.
