A retired French sports teacher has turned himself in to police after being caught making sexual propositions to what he believed was a 14-year-old girl online — a persona that was, in fact, an AI-generated face and voice operated by a popular male social media influencer. The case has reignited a broader debate in France about the ethics and legality of citizen-led entrapment operations targeting suspected paedophiles.

The 66-year-old man, identified as Dominique B, handed himself in to a police station in Vesoul, a town in eastern France, on Tuesday — one day after his conversation with the fake persona was broadcast live across multiple platforms. The operation was run by an influencer known as FINNYZYY, who superimposed an AI-generated girl's face and voice over his own image during a 40-minute video call. The illusion was imperfect — the influencer had to cover part of his chin to conceal his beard — but it was sufficient to deceive the former teacher. More than 40,000 people watched the exchange live, and the footage has since been viewed around a million times. During the call, Dominique B suggested meeting the