Harry Potter star Stan Yanevski has expressed concerns about AI and deepfakes in the wake of a scary experience one of his fans had.
Stan is best known for portraying Viktor Krum in 2005's Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. While the movie came out 20 years ago, Harry Potter fans still approach Stan to this day and many follow him on Instagram where he boasts almost 300,000 followers.
With the passionate fans in mind, Stan tries to keep Viktor Krum's memory alive on social media.
"I try to be as active as possible on social media to give back to people," Stan told UNILAD. "We owe that to our fans and followers."
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He went on to say of the other type of content he shares away from things related to the film franchise: "I'm pretty sure not all that follow me are Harry Potter fans, because I do a lot of things. I do motorcycling, I do fitness training, I do funny content."
While social media is a great way to interact with fans - with one of Stan's videos amassing more than 9,000,000 views - there's a more sinister side to it as well.
Sadly, disingenuous people online can use things like artificial intelligence to scam people into making them believe they're speaking to a celebrity that they're a fan of.
For example, a French woman was scammed out of thousands of euros by someone posing as Brad Pitt.
A similar instance occurred in 2024 that led to Spanish police arresting five people in connection to two women being scammed out of their money by another fake Pitt.
A fan of Stan's fans almost had a similar fate, he tells UNILAD, after she believed she was chatting to the Bulgarian actor online.
Stan said: "The internet is like an endless ocean; that's why we are verified on our profiles. You know, we post stories, lives. If you want the real thing, that's where you can find it. The rest? Believe nothing."
He went on to share: "I had a case where the cousin of a girl got in contact with me. That particular girl was in contact with a fake me, obviously sending pictures, and I don't know what else they sent her. But she was so in love that she was about to sell her house and send all her money to that guy claiming to be in the States.
"Her cousin got in contact with me and explained all that, and I was like 'man, that's not me'. I would never ask someone to sell their house, send me all their money and come and live with me. It just makes no sense."
Stan proceeded to get in touch with the woman who was the victim of the scam and fortunately she went on realize the gravity of the situation and that she'd been speaking to a fake profile, therefore, she did not sell her home.
"It's tough," he added. "I've been fighting this war and I believe I've created a community. On my social media as a whole, we look out for each other and as soon as there is something fake out there, they send it to me."
Long story short, if something online seems to good to be true... it probably is too good to be true.
Topics: Harry Potter, Social Media, Instagram, Celebrity, News, Nostalgia
Niamh Shackleton