AI clip falsely shared as tsunami hitting Japan

The video, which appears to be filmed from a plane and shows waves approaching a coastline, was shared on Facebook on July 30.

"Tsunami in japan, prayer for japan," the overlaid text says with a hashtag #prayerforrussia.   

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Screenshot of false Facebook post taken on August 8, 2025, with red X added by AFP

Millions of people were put on high alert in countries along the Pacific Ocean after the 8.8-magnitude earthquake off Russia's Kamchatka peninsula on July 30, 2025 (archived link). 

In Japan, where a massive quake and tsunami killed 15,000 people in 2011, almost two million people were ordered to higher ground, but the biggest wave was 1.3 metres (4.3 feet). 

Japan downgraded its tsunami alert to an advisory later on July 30, and waves of up to 0.7 metres were still being observed the day after. 

The same video of the purported waves was also shared by more than 170 Facebook pages with a misspelled caption the "first tunia (sic) to hit Hokkaido, Japan this afternoon", with many of the pages directing users to a website selling home items. 

The claim was also shared elsewhere on Facebook and TikTok, garnering a total of 39 million views combined. 

But the video is inauthentic. 

Using Google reverse image search, AFP found the clip had surfaced online on April 29, uploaded by a YouTube channel that states it shares AI-generated visuals in its bio (archived links here and here). 

"From 30,000 feet...I saw this," the video's caption said, including hashtags saying it was made with artificial intelligence.

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Screenshot comparison of the false Facebook post (L) and the YouTube video with the description "altered or synthetic content" highlighted by AFP

The channel also added an "altered or synthetic" label to the video, which, according to YouTube, discloses "altered or synthetically generated content that seems realistic" (archived link). 

AFP found visual anomalies throughout the clip. 

The white water unnaturally separates from the rest of the wave as it advances towards the shoreline. 

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The plane from which the video was filmed also does not appear to be moving forward. 

The circulating video does not correspond to footage that Japanese broadcaster NHK released of tsunami waves that hit Japan's coastal areas on July 30 (archived link). 

NHK also reported waves between 50 to 80 centimetres (1.6 to 2.6 feet) were observed along the coast of Hokkaido.

AFP has repeatedly fact-checked the deluge of AI-generated videos misrepresenting disasters, as well as images falsely linked to the earthquake in Russia.