MARION COUNTY, Fla. – A Central Florida woman says a hacker superimposed a photo of her standing next to a stranger in a fabricated hospital image and then used it to swindle her Facebook friends out of thousands of dollars.
“I was in complete shock, and then utter disgust,” Tessie Hutcheson told News 6. “It’s so horrific.”
Hutcheson said someone hacked her Facebook profile in late March and locked her out of her account.
Using a real photo of Hutcheson’s face, the hacker posted an altered image on her Facebook page that appeared to show Hutcheson standing next to an elderly man in a hospital bed.
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“Please keep my uncle in your prayers over the next few days,” a caption under the bogus Facebook photo stated. “He’s not doing well, and your support means a lot.”
Hutcheson said she does not have an uncle in the hospital and has never met the man in the manipulated photograph.
The hacker, posing at Hutcheson, then began posting photos on her Facebook page of various items for sale including vehicles, a boat, a watch, living room furniture, a washing machine, and a refrigerator. Prices for the items ranged from a few hundred to several thousand dollars.
“It’s so heartbreaking my uncle is sick and moving to a care facility,” states a post on Hutcheson’s hacked Facebook page. “We need some money for his move, that’s why we are trying to get rid of the items.”
Hutcheson said she soon received a text message from one of her friends who had reportedly wired a $2,000 deposit for a vehicle to someone the friend erroneously thought was Hutcheson.
“I called her immediately and said, ‘It’s a scam!” Hutcheson told News 6. “If you’re buying anything from me, it’s a scam.”
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Hutcheson, who was unable to access her own Facebook account to warn people about the fraudulent activity, estimates that the hacker defrauded her friends out of at least $8,000.
News 6 has learned the photograph of the unidentified man in a hospital bed has been used in similar Facebook scams around the world, sometimes with other people digitally inserted into the image.
“This hacker has access to all of our family photos,” said Hutcheson’s husband Corey. “With AI, it makes this really concerning that they could use our children, our friends, our family.”
Meta Platforms, which owns Facebook, did not respond to questions from News 6 about Hutcheson’s account or why the company had apparently failed to identify the hospital photo as one used in other fraudulent schemes.
Hutcheson said she repeatedly tried to alert Meta to the scheme while it was underway but claims it took multiple attempts over several days to reach a human representative.
It was not immediately clear how the hacker may have accessed Hutcheson’s Facebook account.
Hutcheson said she found an online customer service chat on her associated Instagram account that indicated the hacker may have tricked Meta into resetting her Facebook password and changing the email address used to access the account.
News 6 could not independently verify the authenticity of the online chat, and Meta did not respond to questions about it.
Hutcheson’s Facebook page disappeared from the social media platform a few days after it was compromised. It is unclear whether Meta or the hacker shut down the account.
So far Hutcheson has been unsuccessful in restoring her Facebook account, which she said contains photos and memories spanning nearly two decades.
“This isn’t a new thing, which is worrisome,” said Hutcheson. “I want people to realize how far this has gone.”