Image of damage caused by leak at the Louvre is AI-generated

"New crisis at Louvre: Water leak at Paris museum damages hundreds of ancient books," reads the headline of an article published by Pakistan's Geo News on December 8, 2025.

The article includes an image showing the floor of a room where artefacts are displayed covered in water. Several scattered books and what appears to be a sheet of cardboard are also lying on the floor.

"Hundreds of rare books in the Egyptian antiquities department have been damaged by a water leak, exposing chronic neglect of the historic institution's infrastructure," reads the Geo News report.

Image

Screenshot of the Geo News report captured on December 10, 2025, with a red X added by AFP

The same image was also shared in similar Facebook posts from Egypt, France and Canada, after a water leak was discovered at the Louvre on November 26 (archived link).

The leak affected "between 300 and 400 works," Francis Steinbock, deputy general administrator of the museum, told AFP on December 5. He described the damaged items as Egyptology journals and scientific documentation used by researchers that date from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

While "extremely useful", they are "by no means unique", Steinbock said, adding there were no "irreparable and definitive losses in these collections".

The Louvre's press service told AFP on December 8 that the leak -- attributed to an accidentally opened valve in the heating and ventilation system -- occurred in a library in the Mollien wing, a space intended for researchers and closed to the public (archived link).

The service said the circulating image, however, "does not correspond in any way to reality" and does not show a real room in the museum.

AFP has previously debunked claims in French that the image shows the damage caused by the leak.

An analysis of an uncropped version of the image shared in a French Facebook post shows it bears the watermark "Grok" in the bottom-right corner, indicating it was generated using the AI chatbot.

Image

Screenshot of the falsely shared image shared on Facebook, with the Grok watermark highlighted by AFP

It also contains inconsistencies indicative of AI-generated content, such as a distorted book and floor tile in the centre and right of the image. The ceiling lights also appear to be irregularly arranged.

Image

Screenshot of the falsely shared image, with visual inconsistencies highlighted by AFP

Results from an analysis of the image on the Hive Moderation tool gave the image a 99.6 percent probability of being generated using AI.

Image

Screenshot of the results from the Hive Moderation tool

The Louvre has also been targeted with other false claims since an embarrassing daylight heist at the museum that saw thieves make off with crown jewels worth an estimated US$102 million (archived link).