A woman who lost $850,000 to fraudsters pretending to be Brad Pitt is facing a wave of abuse and ridicule online.

A French woman who revealed on television how she lost her life savings to fraudsters pretending to be Brad Pitt has faced a wave of abuse and ridicule online, leading to the interview being canceled on Tuesday.

The woman, named Anne, told TF1’s Seven to Eight program that she believed she was having an affair with the Hollywood star, which led to her divorcing her husband and handing over $850,000.

Fraudsters are using fake social media and WhatsApp accounts, as well as AI image creation technology to send Anne what appear to be selfies and messages from Pitt.

In order to get money, they pretended that the 61-year-old actor needed money to pay for kidney treatment, and his bank accounts were allegedly closed because of Divorce proceedings with his ex-wife Angelina Jolie.

Anne, a 53-year-old interior decorator with mental health issues, spent a year and a half believing she was talking to Pitt and only realized she had been duped when news of Pitt’s real-life relationship with girlfriend Ines de Ramon emerged.

“The story that aired this Sunday has caused a wave of witness abuse,” wrote TF1 host Harry Roselmack on his X account on Tuesday. “In order to protect the victims, we have decided to withdraw it from our fields.”

Anne was mentioned by this station during the broadcast that she was suffering from epilepsy and was receiving treatment at the hospital.

The interview, in which he was apparently taped and even shared photos of his family with reporters, went viral on Monday.

It sparked sarcastic comments and jokes, but some online critics accused TF1 of failing to protect a vulnerable person who may not have known the consequences of going public.

Toulouse Football Club tweeted that “Brad told us he will be on the pitch on Wednesday” for the club’s next game, before retracting the message and apologizing.

Netflix France also posted on social media promoting “four films you can see with Brad Pitt (really) for free.”

Scams in love has been a feature of the Internet since the advent of email, but experts say artificial intelligence has increased the risk of identity theft, fraud and online fraud.

“These people deserve hell”

Anne told TF1 that she was first contacted by someone pretending to be Pitt’s mother shortly after she started using Instagram for the first time while on a skiing trip with her family in France.

“He told me that his son needed someone like me,” Anne explained.

The scammers messaged him again a few days later, this time pretending to be Pitt.

“At first I thought it was a lie, that it was ridiculous,” Anne explained to TF1. “But I’m not familiar with social media and I didn’t really understand what was happening to me.”

“I wonder why they chose me to do such a bad thing?” he continued. “I never hurt anyone. These people deserve hell.”

More than 64,000 Americans were ripped off by more than $1 billion in romance scams by 2023—double the $500 million just four years ago, according to the Federal Trade Commission.

By 2023, adults will be arrested for nearly $3.4 billion in financial crimes, according to FBI data. The agency recently warned that AI has increased “credibility” or criminal scams given that it “helps create content and can correct human errors that could be warning signs of fraud.”