An attractive female Twitter user in Japan recently shocked her tens of thousands of fans after going on a national television show to unmask herself as a 50-year-old man using a popular smartphone app to alter her appearance. I think it’s safe to say that after reading this story, you’ll never trust another internet photo again. Nor should you!

Azusa Gakuyuki, a young, attractive girl who had been entertaining her Twitter followers with photos of herself indulging in her biggest passions (motorcycle riding, mountain hiking, skiing and other outdoorsy activities) went on popular television program Monday Late Show (から夜ふかし) to reveal something that left everyone flabbergasted. The beautiful girl, who appeared to be in her early 20s, was actually a 50-year-old man using the popular app FaceApp to alter his appearance and pass himself off as a woman.

Photo: Monday Late Show

When asked why he went through the trouble of turning himself into an attractive girl on Twitter, the middle-aged man gave an answer that has become very common in this social media age when people look for approval in the forms of likes and comments.

Apparently, when he first started posting photos of himself on Twitter, he only received a handful of reactions from people, so he started looking into ways of attracting attention on social media. Right about 2019, FaceApp was gaining prominence, so he decided to give it a try and was blown away by the possibilities.

Photo: @azusagakuyuki

After playing around with the app’s filters, the man managed to turn his face into that of a young, attractive woman, and noticed a change in people’s reactions as soon as he posted his first photo as Azusa Gakuyuki. I guess he got hooked on the attention, because he has been posting as her for the last two years, and getting several thousand likes on each picture he posts.

So why make the huge revelation now, after all this time? Well, according to several sources, there had been some controversy online regarding one of his recent Twitter photos, in which the reflection of a man taking the photo was spotted in the mirror of a motorcycle. But while some found it odd, most just assumed that he was Azusa’s father taking a photo of her.

After getting wind of the controversy surrounding this beautiful Twitter influencer, the Monday Late Show production team got in touch with her and asked if she was willing to meet them in person. The revelation was caught on camera, with the attractive girl arriving at the meeting site on a motorcycle, and taking her off her helmet to reveal her real face.

Going back to examine Azusa’s Twitter photos after learning the truth, I did get a feeling that some had been over-edited, but I never would have imagined that the protagonist wasn’t even female…

As you can imagine, both the show’s audience and Azusa Gakayuki’s fans were left stunned by the revelation, but while a few criticized the man for deceiving his followers, many lauded his editing skills and his outside-the-box approach to gaining a following online. Believe it or not, Azusa’s following has been growing at an even faster rate since “her” TV appearance.

This certainly not the first time we’ve featured men passing themselves off as girls on the internet, but most others relied on makeup and angles to hide their true gender. But with the technology opening up all kinds of opportunities, stories like Azusa’s were inevitable.

 

For an even more impressive transformation, check out this South Korean youtuber who uses a fake face digitally created with the help of artificial intelligence and machine learning. Be warned, you won’t be able to trust your eyes after watching this.