Microsoft names cybercriminals behind AI deepfake network

Microsoft has named multiple threat actors part of a cybercrime gang accused of developing malicious tools capable of bypassing generative AI guardrails to generate celebrity deepfakes and other illicit content. An updated complaint identifies the individuals as Arian Yadegarnia from Iran (aka 'Fiz'), Alan Krysiak of the United Kingdom (aka 'Drago'), Ricky Yuen from Hong Kong, China (aka 'cg-dot'), and Phát Phùng Tấn of Vietnam (aka 'Asakuri'). As the company explained today, these threat actors are key members of a global cybercrime gang that it tracks as Storm-2139. "Members of Storm-2139 exploited exposed customer credentials scraped from public sources to unlawfully access accounts with certain generative AI services," said Steven Masada, Assistant General Counsel at Microsoft's Digital Crimes Unit. "They then altered the capabilities of these services and resold access to other malicious actors, providing detailed instructions on how to generate harmful and illicit content, in ... Read full article.