'Please don't tax the rich.' Seattle crosswalks hacked with audio deepfake of Jeff Bezos

Pedestrians at several Seattle intersections were surprised by a rogue message when they pushed the crosswalk button on Wednesday.

On the corner of 43rd street and University Ave, a spoofed voice of Amazon co-founder Jeff Bezos blared from a speaker that normally gives instructions on when it’s safe to cross.

“Hi it’s Jeff Bezos,” the recording said. “This crosswalk is sponsored by Amazon Prime with an important message: Please don’t tax the rich."

Listen here:

The recording went on to sarcastically lament the possibility of wealthy residents moving out of Seattle.

“Otherwise, all the other billionaires will move to Florida, too....then normal people could afford to live here again,” it said.

The Seattle Department of Transportation confirmed Friday that they have removed the fake walk signal messages from six crosswalks.

In an emailed statement to KUOW, a spokesperson for SDOT said the agency has removed “the fake walk signal messages in all the locations where we know tampering occurred earlier this week.”

One of the impacted crosswalks, Fairview Avenue and Denny Way, now plays the standard crosswalk recording. The agency did not say whether engineers have restored the regular audio recordings at all of the impacted crosswalks.

SDOT added that they’re working with a vendor to explore “stronger security measures to prevent future hacking.”

The hacker behind the prank appeared to use AI to impersonate Bezos and satirize the tech industry’s opposition to new wealth taxes that have been proposed in Olympia.

The deepfake comes on the heels of similar incidents in Silicon Valley. Crosswalks there were hacked with impersonations of Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk, offering similar satirical messages, according to The Los Angeles Times.

The Seattle Department of Transportation said it is working to fix crosswalks at multiple locations across several neighborhoods, and encourages residents to report any additional hacks they discover. The known locations are below, according to SDOT.

• 15th Ave NE & NE 45th St

• 15th Ave NE & NE 43rd St

• Brooklyn Ave NE & NE 45th St

• Fairview Ave & Denny Way

• 35th Ave NE & NE 70th St

“The audio recordings at crosswalks play a critical role for people who are blind or have limited vision, helping them to cross streets safely,” an SDOT spokesperson said. “We are concerned that someone would disregard the safety of people to make a political statement.”

It’s unclear whether the Seattle and Silicon Valley hacks are coordinated or inspired by one another. A YouTube video describes hacking crosswalk speakers as relatively simple. The YouTube hacker noted in the comments that views of the video were way up over the past few days.

KUOW's Noel Gasca contributed to this article.

EDITOR'S NOTE: This story was updated at 3:45 p.m. Friday, April 18, 2025, to include a statement from SDOT that they had removed the fake crosswalk messages from six hacked Seattle intersections.