"나는 Musk야... 투자 수익을 내줄게" 사칭해 돈을 갈취한 미국 남성

Approached via Facebook to extort approximately 350 million won

A man in his 50s in the United States who impersonated Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, and extorted money from a woman in her 70s has been arrested by the police.

Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla. Photo by Reuters Yonhap News

On the 23rd (local time), Business Insider reported that the Bradenton Police Department in Florida, USA, arrested Jeffrey Moinihan Jr. (56) this week.

Last year, Moinihan created a fake Musk account on Facebook and befriended a 74-year-old woman living in Texas. For several months, he encouraged her to invest, promising an investment return of $55 million (approximately 77.3 billion KRW) and induced her to transfer money. The woman eventually sent the money, which went directly into bank accounts owned by Moinihan and his business. The estimated amount of damage was $250,000 (approximately 350 million KRW), but the victim’s husband claimed to the police that "my wife transferred about $600,000 (approximately 843 million KRW) to Moinihan." The police arrested Moinihan at his home on the 19th.

Over the past few years, numerous scammers have targeted Musk for impersonation. In particular, last May, Hong Kong authorities warned that cryptocurrency scammers were using AI deepfake videos of Musk to promote fake trading websites.

Also, an Australian man lost $50,000 (approximately 70 million KRW) in June after entering personal information for cryptocurrency trading following an interview with Musk on social media. The Musk he interviewed was a deepfake, a fake Musk created by AI.

In South Korea, there was also a case where a person named A impersonated Elon Musk and approached a Korean woman named B via social media, extorting $50,000 from her.