Romance-baiting scam: AI-assisted pig butchering workflows

This case study was originally published in OpenAI’s February 2025⁠(opens in a new window) report.

Actor

We banned a cluster of ChatGPT accounts that were translating and generating short comments in Japanese, Chinese, and English. This activity appears to have originated in Cambodia and was consistent with a romance and investment scam (otherwise known as “pig butchering”). Meta recently identified related activity⁠(opens in a new window) on their platform that appeared to originate from a newly stood up scam compound in Cambodia.

Behavior

This network used our models to translate and generate short comments. The actors’ primary language appears to have been Chinese. The output was in a range of languages, notably Japanese and Chinese, but also English.

The actors used our models for two main activities. First, they would generate comments that were posted publicly on social media platforms including Facebook, X, and Instagram. Each social media account typically featured one or more profile pictures of a young woman: We assess that at least some of these profile pictures were copied from real models or influencers, rather than being AI-generated.

Most of the comments generated were posted in reply to real people’s social media posts. Some of the posts that the operators replied to were months or years old. This operation typically targeted men whose public profiles suggested they were aged over 40, often in the medical professions. The operation frequently replied to posts about golf, suggesting a deliberate targeting strategy. Occasionally, the scammers would post about political issues or current events.

Second, and more frequently, the operators would generate short comments that resembled parts of an online conversation. This typically consisted of translating comments out of Chinese into a target language (Japanese or English), or from the target language back into Chinese. This is consistent with scammers using the model primarily to translate ongoing chats.