Artificial intelligence (AI) has proven effective in tackling fake celebrity advertisements, with the number falling to fewer than 1,000 per week from the more than 30,000 in May last year, the Ministry of Digital Affairs told a news conference after a weekly Cabinet meeting.
The ministry’s fraud-busting app, where people can report Internet scams, has been downloaded more than 17,000 times since September last year and has received more than 22,000 reports of fraud, it said.
About 120,000 ads were found to be scams, the ministry said, adding that it also asked Meta, Google, Line and TikTok to take those down.
Photo: CNA
Tips that the app received mainly came from Internet users, particularly public figures that had been impersonated for fraudulent purposes, it said.
The ministry said it also uses AI to scan online content to identify fraud.
People who were impersonated included city and county chiefs, legislators, Internet celebrities and famous businesspeople, with more than 500 of them reporting fraud through the app, it said.
Most of the celebrities who were impersonated were working in the finance industry, it added.
Through AI scanning, the number of fake celebrity ads decreased to fewer than 1,000 per week from more than 30,000 per week in May last year, the ministry said.
Administration for Digital Industries Deputy Director-General Huang Ya-ping (黃雅萍) said that while the number of scam advertisements impersonating celebrities has decreased, fraudulent tactics continue to evolve.
Therefore, AI systems would continue to be trained for proactive scanning using various keywords, she said.
Data collected from the app also showed that most of the tips came from 28 people, with each reporting more than 1,000 scams, the ministry said, adding that one of them gave 4,000 valid tips.
Executive Yuan spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) said that the Criminal Investigation Bureau had taken down more than 63,000 advertisements from January to last month.
Seven of the 17 NT$10 million (US$311,604) winning receipts from the November-December uniform invoice lottery remain unclaimed as of today, the Ministry of Finance said, urging winners to redeem their prizes by May 5. The reminder comes ahead of the release of the winning numbers for the January-February lottery tomorrow. Among the unclaimed receipts was one for a NT$173 phone bill in Keelung, while others were for a NT$5,913 purchase at Costco in Taipei's Neihu District (內湖), a NT$49 purchase at a FamilyMart in New Taipei City's Tamsui District (淡水), and a NT$500 purchase at a tea shop in New Taipei City's
Taiwanese officials were shown the first of 66 F-16V fighter jets purchased by Taiwan from the United States, the Ministry of National Defense said yesterday, adding the aircraft has completed an initial flight test and is expected to be delivered later this year. A delegation led by Deputy Minister of National Defense Hsu Szu-chien (徐斯儉) visited Lockheed Martin’s F-16 C/D Block 70 (also known as F-16V) assembly line in South Carolina on March 16 to view the aircraft. The jet will undergo a final acceptance flight in the US before being delivered to Taiwan, the
Deliveries of delayed F-16V jets are expected to begin in September, Minister of National Defense Wellington Koo (顧立雄) said today, after senior defense officials visited the US last week. The US in 2019 approved a US$8 billion sale of Lockheed Martin F-16 jets to Taiwan, a deal that would take the nation’s F-16 fleet to more than 200 jets, but the project has been hit by issues including software problems. Koo appeared today before a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, which is discussing different versions of the special defense budget this week. The committee is questioning officials today,
TALENT SCOUTING: The university is investing substantial funds in its future to bring in the kind of researchers that would keep the college internationally competitive National Taiwan University (NTU) plans to invest NT$2 billion (US$62.6 million) to launch two programs aimed at attracting and retaining top research talent, university president Chen Wen-chang (陳文章) said yesterday. The funding would support the “Palm Grove Scholars Project,” which targets academics aged 40 to 55. Up to 20 scholars would be selected, each receiving as much as NT$10 million annually, Chen said. The initiative is designed to attract leading researchers to Taiwan and strengthen NTU’s global competitiveness by fostering a more research-friendly environment and expanding international collaboration, he said. NTU is also introducing a “Hong Hu” chair grant, which would provide Palm
RSS