First AI Celebrity? The Curious Case Of ‘KPOP Star’ Saint Von Colucci

Canadian Actor Saint Von Colucci Reportedly Dead After Multiple Surgeries Does Not Exist!

News breaking this week suggested that Saint Von Colucci, a 22-year-old actor, singer, and composer who is Canadian-Portuguese had passed away. Saint, as per the reports, had a rather significant pull in the South Korean entertainment scene.

He is said to have died due to complications from undergoing 12 plastic surgery procedures in an attempt to look like famous BTS member Jimin. Apparently, the surgeries cost more than 200,000 and were meant to help the artist overcome discrimination “against his Western traits”.

However, in a rather bizarre turn of events, it has come to the realization of many that Saint Von Colucci does not exist! According to Aljazeera, Saint is a fictional character built by AI and the debacle is the “first known case of AI being used to trick media outlets en masse into spreading misinformation.”

This fascinating chain of events was kickstarted by a press release from a public relations agency called HYPE Public Relations. The release, which is poorly worded, announces that Von Colucci had passed away at a hospital in Seoul on April 23rd.

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The story was picked by several media houses in the United Kingdom, South Korea, India, Malaysia, and the Philippines to the United States and Canada. This includes the Daily Mail, who have since taken down the story from their platform.

Reports picked up pictures of Von Colucci, showing before-and-after surgery photos that appeared to show his transformation from a white man into a person with East Asian features. Saying the press release was “fishy” is an understatement as it had several red flags that in retrospect show how unreliable the source should have been considered.

From the broken English used, to the inactive links provided for Von Colucci’s Instagram account. Not to mention, the cited hospital in which he allegedly died does not exist!

Aljazeera reports that a look into Hype revealed that the company was only registered a few weeks prior to the alleged death of the artist. When they attempted to contact HYPE by calling the contact listed on their website, no one answered. However, in a rather comical development, the number did reply later in a text message that read, “Wtf do u want.”

Is He An AI-Generated Figure?

Saint is described as a songwriter and composer who has worked on several K-pop songs and also allegedly worked with many stars in the genre. However, his online presence is fairly limited and nobody as of yet, has come forward to mourn his passing.

While is credited with working on several songs, his music is not available on any mainstream music streaming platforms. This includes South Korean ones including Melon and Genie. An album that is being mentioned and referred to as his debut album is named ‘T1K T0K H1GH SCH00L.’ That too, like the rest of his “music” does not exist.

To add more doubt into his existence, The Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency’s Violent Crime Investigation Unit said that there was no record of such a case being reported.

The Canadian Embassy on the matter released a statement saying, “Global Affairs Canada is aware of reports of the death of a Canadian in South Korea and is working to confirm the information. No further information is available at this time.”

The issue of Von Colucci being an AI figure is mostly due to his online presence. While he has a vague online presence, the little that is there does little to compel someone that he is real.

Online images of Von Colucci are blurry, hazy, and oddly detailed, with some instances of malformed hands which is a telltale sign of the usage of AI.

Aljazeera states that while detectors for AI-generated images are limited, they show that there is a high possibility of having been generated by AI.

As speculated on Twitter by Raphael Rashid, a journalist, Von Colucci is a product of AI. As he states, “We have now entered the era of fake news generated by AI. It’s real, and the implications are serious, especially for journalists. Think about it: if anyone can create news stories that are convincing and images that are believable *all with just a few clicks* and fool everyone in the process, how can we trust what we see and read online? How can we separate truth from fiction, especially when the fake content generated is so sophisticated?”