TikTok trend provokes authorities as UK and US police warn “antics” drain resources

A new TikTok trend has sparked concern in the US and UK, as authorities warn people not to trust everything they see.

TikTok is rife with ridiculous trends, and this latest viral moment has led to nationwide warnings by police.

In the UK and the US, TikTok users are pranking their loved ones by generating convincing images of homeless people entering or breaking into their homes.

One video, which received over 735,000 views on TikTok, shows a woman pranking her husband with AI-generated images of a homeless man sitting at her kitchen table and relaxing on her couch.

While the whole video feels very staged, it has sparked a viral trend in which TikTok users use specific software to generate lifelike scenes involving the homeless.

@daveandjanie Pranking my husband with the ai homeless man… creepy how real it looks!! #daveandjanie #homelessman #aihomelessmanprank #ai #fypシ゚viral ♬ Blue Danube: Waltz - London Symphony Orchestra

However, this “prank” doesn’t come without its consequences. One fearful parent called the police in the UK after an AI homeless man joke.

A teenager from Dorest, England, decided to prank her parent by sending AI generated images of a homeless man and saying that he refused to leave their home.

The parent called emergency services after genuinely believing that a homeless man had entered their house and wouldn’t leave, the Daily Echo reports.

@mmmjoemele

PLEASE WAIT FOR IT 😂

♬ Blue Danube: Waltz - London Symphony Orchestra

The same problem is also occurring in the US, with a social media post showing a homeless man roaming around Oak Harbor High School in Washington, Fox 13 Seattle reports.

The Oak Harbor Police Department issued a press release published on Facebook to say that this was a false report and the image was fake.

This prank isn’t totally harmless, as unnecessary calls to emergency services waste time and resources.

Authorities in the US and UK are asking friends and family to verify the sender's claims before calling the police.

“If you receive a message and pictures similar to the above antics from friends or family, please attempt to check it isn’t a prank before dialling 999,” a social media post from Dorset police seen by the BBC reads.

@lulguccii not the “ B” word 😂😂😂☠️ whewww #homelessman #homelessmanprank #ai #boyfriend #fypシ ♬ original sound - @bfunky comedy

Artificial intelligence is only deepening distrust

With the rise of AI comes its inevitable misuse, which only deepens our distrust of what we see online.

Scammers in certain countries are now using deepfakes and artificially generated images to fool people into investing their money in fraudulent schemes.

For example, in Vietnam, cybercriminals are using AI to create realistic deepfake videos for extortion, marking a shift from traditional fraud tactics like phone scams, phishing emails, and romantic trickery.

The rise of celebrity fraud is also an issue, as scammers are using AI to generate images and videos of celebrities with the intention of defrauding their victims out of thousands.

One case involved a Southampton man who lost hundreds to a deepfake Jennifer Aniston scam, exposing the rise of AI-driven celebrity fraud.

In Brazil, a group of scammers used deepfake images of model Gisele Bundchen and other celebrities to make millions of dollars from online fraud.

Alongside AI slop, people have been using OpenAI’s latest text-to-image model, Sora, to create realistic but very fake videos of notable figures, including Sam Altman.

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