{"slug": "british-pm-burnham-duped-by-white-house-impostor", "title": "British PM Burnham duped by White House impostor", "summary": "British Prime Minister Andy Burnham exchanged messages with an impostor posing as White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, Politico reported on Monday. The FBI has warned of 'malicious actors' misusing AI to impersonate senior government officials, and the White House confirmed the incident was not due to a hack of Wiles's devices.", "body_md": "# British PM Burnham duped by White House impostor\n\n*The FBI has warned of ‘malicious actors’ misusing AI to impersonate senior government officials.*\n\nBritish [Prime Minister Andy Burnham](/news/2026/7/20/andy-burnham-pledges-end-to-political-instability-as-he-becomes-uk-pm) has reportedly exchanged messages with someone posing as a senior government official in the United States.\n\nThe UK leader believed he was speaking to White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles in a recent exchange of messages, the Politico news outlet reported on Monday. US authorities have warned in recent months about AI being used to impersonate senior government officials.\n\n## Recommended Stories\n\nlist of 3 items- list 1 of 3\n[Trump’s Pentagon demands media agree not to reveal ‘unauthorised’ material](/news/2025/9/22/trumps-pentagondemandsmedia-agree-not-to-reveal-unauthorised-material) - list 2 of 3\n[After OpenAI disclosure, Anthropic says Claude also hacked outside systems](/news/2026/7/31/after-openai-disclosure-anthropic-claude-hacked-outside-systems) - list 3 of 3\n[Saudi intelligence chief meets Iraqi PM, renews Riyadh visit invitation](/news/2026/8/8/saudi-intelligence-chief-meets-iraqi-pm-renews-riyadh-visit-invitation)\n\nAccording to the report, sources said that Burnham exchanged a “few messages” but that they were “of no significance”. The contents of the messages remain unclear.\n\nBurnham then reportedly became suspicious, cut off communications and informed the relevant authorities.\n\nA British government spokesperson refused to comment on the report, saying it is against policy to discuss “national security matters”.\n\nThe British Embassy in the US was reportedly extremely concerned about the incident and decided to inform the White House, which has since confirmed that the “incident had nothing to do with the Chief of Staff’s devices being hacked”.\n\nConcern over communications security has risen during President Donald Trump’s second term.\n\nThe FBI warned of “malicious actors” misusing AI to impersonate senior government officials as it launched an investigation last year, alongside the White House, into an imposter who posed as Wiles and contacted senior Republicans and business officials.\n\nTwo months later, the State Department announced it was investigating an imposter who pretended to be Secretary of State Marco Rubio and contacted three foreign ministers.\n\nThe Trump administration came under [intense scrutiny](/news/2025/3/27/pete-hegseth-says-signal-chat-had-no-war-plans-hes-wrong-say-experts) in March last year after it emerged that a US journalist was added to a group chat on the Signal app in which top security officials were discussing military strikes on the Houthis in Yemen.\n\nA report published by the Pentagon in December concluded that Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth could have endangered US soldiers after sharing secret information in the chat.", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/british-pm-burnham-duped-by-white-house-impostor", "canonical_source": "https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/8/17/british-pm-burnham-duped-by-white-house-impostor?traffic_source=rss", "published_at": "2026-08-17 16:48:24+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-08-17 17:13:38.356453+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["ai-safety", "ai-policy"], "entities": ["Andy Burnham", "Susie Wiles", "Politico", "FBI", "White House", "Donald Trump", "Marco Rubio", "Pete Hegseth"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/british-pm-burnham-duped-by-white-house-impostor", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/british-pm-burnham-duped-by-white-house-impostor.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/british-pm-burnham-duped-by-white-house-impostor.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/british-pm-burnham-duped-by-white-house-impostor.jsonld"}}