https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ced5wvn48q5o

Scammers using AI to lure shoppers to fake businesses

Image source, C'est La Vie

Image caption,

The images of "Patrick and Eileen" are among those AI-generated, experts say

ByAlice Cullinane and Rebecca Woods, Birmingham

• Published

  8 October 2025

• 463 Comments

Unscrupulous foreign firms are using AI-generated images and false back stories to pose as family-run UK businesses to lure in shoppers.

Customers say they feel "completely ripped off" after believing they were buying from independent boutiques in England but were delivered cheap clothes and jewellery, mass-shipped from warehouses in east Asia.

Among the websites is C'est La Vie, a shop purporting to be run by couple Eileen and Patrick for 29 years and based in Birmingham's historic Jewellery Quarter - but with a returns address in China.

Consumer guide Which?, external said the growing use of AI tools was making it possible for fraudsters to mislead the public on an "unprecedented" scale.

Another website appearing to use AI-generated images is Mabel & Daisy, a seemingly quintessential, mother and daughter-owned clothing firm, which claims to be based in Bristol but has an address in Hong Kong.

This one contains examples where it did work as well as did not work although the amount of backchecking required make the AI not worth it.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp8w6kn2dyzo

Hannah Read, 37, tried to use an AI chatbot to plan a trip to Norway with her partner and three children.

She wanted to drive from her home in Flintshire, north Wales and cross the North Sea by ferry.

"I thought it might make for a nice drive," Hannah says. "I asked ChatGPT if there was a ferry from the UK to Norway and it said there was one from Newcastle to Bergen."

She later checked a ferry travel website but found no such route exists.

A travel blog detailing how Brits can reach Norway says the last time the route operated was in 2008.

"I did feel a bit disappointed when I found out the information on ChatGPT was incorrect, as I'd got quite excited and had started planning the trip in my head," Hannah adds.

"My advice is don't rely on AI 100%, it's better to still do proper research."

9 minutes ago, studiot said:

the amount of backchecking required make the AI not worth it.

Like all new tools, there are ways it can be used to help and ways it can be used to hurt, but either way here the toothpaste is already out of the tube.

26 minutes ago, iNow said:

Like all new tools, there are ways it can be used to help and ways it can be used to hurt, but either way here the toothpaste is already out of the tube.

Is that poor excuse justification for lack of regulation ?

Unfortunately our politicians are always about 20 years too late with regulations.
And then, as with social media and digital currencies, just when it looks like we might get some regulations, new governments and billionaire investors come in, gut regulations, and twist them for their financial advantage.
( like having billions isn't enough )

43 minutes ago, MigL said:

Unfortunately our politicians are always about 20 years too late with regulations.
And then, as with social media and digital currencies, just when it looks like we might get some regulations, new governments and billionaire investors come in, gut regulations, and twist them for their financial advantage.
( like having billions isn't enough )

We already have plenty of regulations.

They just need to be enforced.

Remember the imaginative way Al Capone was finally taken down ?

Tax dodging. False Acounting.

Just now, studiot said:

Remember the imaginative way Al Capone was finally taken down ?
Tax dodging. False Acounting.

Doesn't work anymore.
Remember Donald Trump ?

6 minutes ago, MigL said:

Doesn't work anymore.
Remember Donald Trump ?

All the more reason to take note of the caveat in the thread title.

My purpose was to warn others, what they do after that is their affair.

Excellent thread, @studiot - these things can unravel trust and integrity so quickly that grassroots awareness is critical if the public is going to be able to have any control of this runaway locomotive. There can't be too many forums and social media gatherings where we get such caveats out there and people talking about them.

13 hours ago, studiot said:

that poor excuse

Wow. Shots fired

13 hours ago, studiot said:

Is that poor excuse justification for lack of regulation ?

I was justifying nothing