Two remanded, eight sent to jail over deepfake videos of Azhari

A Dhaka court on Tuesday placed two accused on a two-day remand and sent another eight accused to jail in a case filed over allegations of producing deepfake videos using the image and voice of Islamic speaker Mizanur Rahman Azhari.

The accused on remand are Md Sarafat Hossain, 24, and Md Shafayet Hossain Shuvo, 21.

The other accused sent to jail are Shahadat Toufiq, 21, Md Imam Hossain Bijoy, 21, Md Rafiqul Hasan, 21, Minhajur Rahman Shahed, 19, Touki Tajwar Ilham, 21, Amid Hasan, 21, Md Abdullah Fahim, 21, and Md Imran, 24.

Dhaka Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Awlad Hossain Muhammad Junaid passed the order, said Assistant Sub-Inspector of the DMP prosecution division Md Mamun Hossain.

According to court sources, the investigation officer produced the accused seeking a 10-day remand, while defense alwyers Mosleh Uddin Jashim, Sharif Aed and others pleaded for cancellation of remand and argued for bail.

According to the case documents, the accused had allegedly been carrying out well-organised digital fraud for a long time. They created deepfake videos using images and voice samples of Azhari and then used them to promote a sexual enhancement product.

The accused allegedly promoted these videos through more than 24 fake Facebook pages and websites, defrauding customers of large sums of money.

A man named Billal Hossian filed the case with Paltan Model police station under Cyber Security Ordinance on 23 April. The accused were arrested the following day.