Grieving parents issue warning after scammers steal identity of daughter who died of bone cancer
The grieving parents of a five-year-old girl who died of bone cancer have found that scammers are using her photos to con people out of money.
Sophie Taylor from Norwich was just five years old when she died of bone cancer in 2019.
Her parents have discovered that a gang in Brazil have lifted large numbers of pictures of her to set up a fake fundraising page in a bid to generate thousands of pounds from kind-hearted donors.
During Sophie's fight against the disease, she touched the lives of many people - defiantly sticking her tongue out in photographs posted on social media and encouraging others to do the same by using the hashtag #takeasophie.
She also struck up a friendship with then-Norwich City star James Maddison, now at Tottenham Hotspur, who supported her campaign and paid tribute after she died.
Her parents, Alex and Kirsty Taylor, from Sprowston near Norwich, set up Sophie's Sparkle Fund in her memory.
Money raised through the fund helps to support children and families affected by childhood cancer, as well as advancing medical research.
The family were notified of the fraud on Sunday evening, by which stage scammers had raised around £2,000 of their £12,000 target. They have no idea of how long the scam had been running.
Mr Taylor said: "What's particularly damaging to us is that they've taken the pictures we had of Sophie going through her journey and they've created a false name of Alice and used all the pictures of Sophie."
The scammers also regularly posted to the page with fictional updates from "Alice".
"They've said: 'I've had a bad day to day, or feeling better today' [to con people] and for us it's brought up that she's not here.
"We should be focusing on adjusting our lives.
"It's hurtful and painful but we think we have to share it so other people don't go through it."
The couple have only recently returned to work full-time and say that the news has been a major setback.
Mrs Taylor said: "It's come into my head at times. When I'm working I have a role to do, but in my own space and time I'll let the emotion out."
The couple have alerted social media companies that the scam site has been advertised on but have yet to hear a response.
They have also contacted Action Fraud and the police.
The family were alerted to the fraudsters by followers of Sophie's genuine page.
When they attempted to view the site they appeared to have been blocked. Mr Taylor believes that all the family members have been blocked by the scammers.
"We are naive to it. When Sophie went through her journey, we wanted to try to stay positive, so we made this positive Instagram page for her.
"We weren't expecting her to die when she did, and we tried to carry it on, but we wouldn't have thought that someone would take her images and make their own campaign and exploit her images. I don't think anyone has the right to do that... they are very selfish people."
The family have gone public to make people aware that such scams exist and prevent other people falling victim to similar schemes.
"We just want people to be aware of fraudulent campaigns, especially abroad. For people who are going through treatment, who are sharing their images, just be aware that this can happen and it can be nipped in the bud quickly.
"We don't want to deter people from donating from really good campaigns, but just to be aware of things."
They thanked all of Sophie's supporters online who reacted so swiftly to try to get the site taken down.
Instagram has been approached for comment.
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