False posts share AI-generated news report about Iran 'surrendering' to Israel
- Published on July 7, 2025 at 04:30
- 3 min read
- By Jan Cuyco, AFP Philippines
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"Breaking news, Iran has officially surrendered to Israel," says a supposed CNN anchor in a Facebook reel shared June 26, 2025.
"A path to peace may finally be in sight between the two nations," he adds before the clip cuts to a group of protesters holding Iranian flags while appearing to apologise to Israel.
The Middle East foes traded devastating missile attacks after Israel launched an unprecedented bombing campaign on June 13 targeting Iran's nuclear and military facilities.
The strikes left more than 900 people dead in Iran and 28 people dead in Israel (archived link).
A ceasefire between Iran and Israel took effect on June 24.
The fabricated CNN video surfaced elsewhere on Facebook, YouTube and TikTok, racking up more than a million views in total.
Several users seemed to believe the report was genuine.
"Very good Iran. Peace. God bless Iran and Israel," one commented.
"Good job Iran. Better to be humble," another said.
CNN's senior vice president of communications Emily Kuhn dismissed the posts.
"This is a fake video and never aired on CNN," Kuhn told AFP on July 2.
The footage also bears signs it was AI-generated.
Compared to genuine CNN coverage of Iranians at a pro-government rally on June 25, the "live" label above the CNN logo is misspelled and the usual timestamp and name of the news programme are instead made up of jumbled characters.
Additionally, the news anchor's mouth does not move in accordance with his speech, another hallmark of AI-altered footage.
Despite the meteoric progress in Generative AI, errors still show up in AI-generated content. These defects are the best way to recognise a fabricated image.
The overly smooth skin and hair of the protesters suggest the video was AI-generated, as AFP previously noted in its video tutorial on spotting inauthentic visuals.
A reverse image search on Google using keyframes from the video found the clip was earlier shared on TikTok on June 24.
The post shows the video was taken from another user whose account is named "Ai VIDEOS".
While the circulating clip does not appear on the user's profile, a review of the account shows similar AI-generated news reports (archived link).
The clips bear an identical "AI VIDEO" text at the lower right corner of the frame.
AFP has debunked a wave of AI-generated visuals being falsely linked to the Iran-Israel conflict (archived link).
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