³ÉÈËÂÛ̳

Professor David Wilson investigates stories of impostors – the fraudsters and con artists who claim to be something they are not, sometimes getting away with it for years.

David explores a story that has a personal connection for him: the case of a fake crime writer. British man Paul Harrison published numerous true crime books and claimed to have first-hand experience of working with the FBI and of personally interviewing the likes of like Ted Bundy. He toured the country selling tickets for live events, where he would tell stories of his encounters with murderers. However, when journalist Robin Perrie went to one of these shows, he smelled a rat. Investigating further, Robin checked with the people Harrison claimed to know, including agents with the FBI, and all of them denied ever meeting him. Robin published his story in The Sun, and Harrison apologised to his fans before disappearing from view. Having actually met Harrison once at a book event, David feels close to the story. He meets Robin to discuss the case and to try to establish what motivated him to lie about his past.

The question of what motivates an impostor like Harrison is hard to answer. David consults with psychiatrist Dr Sohom Das, who has studied psychopathology, to discuss the mentality of the impostor in more depth. Is he a psychopath? Or simply an unscrupulous scam artist?

David also discusses online identity theft with tech expert Chitra Balakrishna. Our digital identities now define us in many ways, and they can be stolen, bought and sold on the dark web. How can we combat this and stay safe online?

There also is a new world of ‘digital impostors’ to worry about, known as deepfakes. David interviews Professor Drew Hemment, an expert in AI from Edinburgh University, to find out more about deepfakes and how they could be used for fraud, or even to corrupt the electoral process. To get right to the heart of how they work, David encounters a deepfake of himself made by Edinburgh University software engineer Evan Morgan. How convincing will it be? Could David himself be replaced one day by an AI rendition of himself?