A fake law firm called Commonwealth Legal, using AI-generated attorney profiles and images, sent fraudulent DMCA copyright notices to website owners demanding backlinks to boost SEO rankings for a gadget review site.
In late March 2024, a fraudulent law firm called Commonwealth Legal sent fake DMCA copyright infringement notices to website owners, including Ernie Smith of the Tedium newsletter. The firm claimed copyright ownership of an Unsplash photo of a keyfob used in Smith's article and demanded he add a credit link to Tech4Gods within five business days. Investigation revealed Commonwealth Legal was entirely fabricated, with its website domain registered on March 1, 2024, using a Canadian IP despite claiming to be based in Arizona. The firm's website featured 12 attorney profiles with AI-generated faces that Reality Defender confirmed were created by a Generative Adversarial Network (GAN) model. The attorney biographies contained implausible credentials, with five supposedly graduating from Harvard, Yale, Stanford, and University of Chicago, while others had nonsensical practice area combinations like 'Copyright Violation and Judicial Criminal Proceedings.' The scheme's purpose was to generate backlinks for SEO manipulation, with the Tech4Gods site owner admitting to purchasing backlinks and using AI writing assistants for content creation. The fraudulent address led to a location that did not match the claimed fourth floor office space.
Domain classification, causal taxonomy, severity scores, and national security assessments were LLM-classified and may contain errors.
Using AI systems to gain a personal advantage over others such as through cheating, fraud, scams, blackmail or targeted manipulation of beliefs or behavior. Examples include AI-facilitated plagiarism for research or education, impersonating a trusted or fake individual for illegitimate financial benefit, or creating humiliating or sexual imagery.
AI system
Due to a decision or action made by an AI system
Intentional
Due to an expected outcome from pursuing a goal
Post-deployment
Occurring after the AI model has been trained and deployed