YouTube has deleted a channel belonging to the South Korean supermodel and TV personality Han Hye-jin after it aired an XRP ($2.43)-themed livestream.

The video appears to have been the work of hackers, wrote South Korean newspaper Maeil Kyungjae, adding that the criminals used deepfake footage of Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse to promote a crypto scam.

“Neither I nor my production team had anything to do with this video. I hope nobody has been harmed or misled by it,” Han said in a statement on her Instagram account.

It is unclear at this stage if and how many people potentially fell victim to the cybercriminals.

As the dangers of deepfake crypto scams continue to intensify, experts warn that malicious players now have access to a wide range of open-source tools.

Han’s team didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Gone ‘in a flash’

Han said she had submitted an appeal to YouTube in a bid to restore her channel, but was still “awaiting a response.”

Her channel mainly focused on lifestyle, food, and fashion. She had amassed over 860,000 subscribers, but said it had been removed “in a flash.”

The livestream in question aired in the early hours of the morning on November 10.

Han said her channel had gone live without her knowledge. She added that she had only become aware of the matter when her acquaintances told her about the livestream later the same morning.

Shortly after the broadcast, YouTube removed the entire channel, temporarily displaying a message that read: “Channel deleted for violation of community guidelines.”

“I am upset and bewildered that the channel I’ve created with so much love for such a long time disappeared in an instant,” Han said.

She added that promoting crypto was “unrelated to my intentions or those of my channel’s production team.”

Ripple boss ‘deepfakes’

Fans said the livestream was titled “Ripple (XRP): CEO’s Growth Forecast.” The deepfake pretended to discuss the outlook for the crypto market and Ripple’s “future strategies.”

Followers said that they suspected a hack when they saw that the stream’s live chat had been disabled.

Once the stream had ended, comments were also disabled.

Experts say that crypto scammers are finding it easier than ever to create deepfakes.

“Deepfake technology has become very accessible now because the tools behind it have been simplified and open-sourced,” Fraser Edwards, the co-founder and CEO of the AI content credentials provider cheqd, told DL News.

“Many new models use low-rank adaptation, which significantly reduces the memory requirements for fine-tuning [AI programs] to specific tasks,” Edwards said. “Deepfakes can now be generated from as few as 20 images in under 15 minutes from a consumer laptop.”

Ripple didn’t immediately return a request for comment.

South Korean stars targeted

South Koreans have found themselves in cybercriminals’ crosshairs in the past.

In 2023, hackers briefly seized control of two South Korean government-run tourism and culture YouTube channels.

They succeeded in renaming the channels “SpaceX Invest.”

And earlier this year, casino scammers used deepfake footage of the South Korean soccer star Son Heung-min to promote a gambling-themed scam.

Last year, a Russian security firm warned that darkweb operators were offering scammers access to a bot that creates deepfake videos featuring the Tesla boss Elon Musk and the American journalist Tucker Carlson.

The firm warned that scammers would use the bot to “generate advertising for fake crypto exchanges.”

In 2023, an expert told DL News that AI solutions are helping crypto scammers “overcome language barriers, reach more people, and cause more destruction.”

Tim Alper is a news correspondent at DL News. Got a tip? Email at talper@dlnews.com.