Image of Thai opposition party's cyber campaigns team is AI-generated
- Published on February 20, 2026 at 06:05
- 3 min read
- By Pasika KHERNAMNUOY, AFP Thailand
The Thai opposition People's Party has come under fire after a former member said it runs an internet monitoring team that smears critics and shapes online discourse, but an image circulating on social media purportedly showing the operation is AI-generated. It contains the watermark of Google's AI assistant, has visual errors indicative of synthetic content and differs from footage published by local media.
The image showing a room filled with dozens of people in orange tops sitting at computer workstations was shared on Facebook on February 14, 2026.
"This is an image showing the environment inside the office that I secretly took while I was mistakenly working as information operations (IO) staff for the orange party," reads its Thai-language caption, referring to Thailand's progressive People's Party.
It surfaced a day after former People's Party MP Tisana Choonhavan claimed during a televised broadcast that online criticism directed at her originated from a cyber-ops unit called "Spectre C" located on the fourth floor of the opposition party's headquarters (archived link).
"Every party has its own IO... It's the party's IT unit, although MPs aren't directly informed about what it does. They monitor comments or opinions about the party -- whether from the media or elsewhere -- and defend the party," she said.
Her allegations came after she criticised the party following their performance in Thailand's February 8 general election, which saw the conservative Bhumjaithai Party ride a wave of nationalism to secure a stunning victory (archived link).
The former MP's allegations also led to Srisuwan Janya, a royalist activist and serial petitioner, asking the Election Commission to dissolve the People's Party.
According to the Bangkok Post, he said the former MP's remarks raised questions about whether party executives or members were linked to Spectre C or whether information operations were carried out on behalf of the party (archived link).
Thailand's constitution bans political parties and candidates from holding shares in media businesses.
Parit Wacharasindhu, a spokesman for the People's Party, rejected the allegations, saying Spectre C was contracted to produce online media and graphics (archived link).
Similar claims the circulating image showed the People's Party IO team were shared elsewhere on Facebook.
But the image is AI-generated.
A reverse image search on Google flagged the image as having been "made with Google AI" in its "About this image" feature.
A star-shaped icon in the lower-right corner of the image also indicates it was generated using Google's AI assistant Gemini (archived link).
Further analysis using SynthID -- a detector launched by Google in May 2025 to identify AI-generated content -- identified with a "very high" level of confidence that the image was created with the help of its AI tools (archived link).
A closer analysis of the falsely shared image also shows several visual inconsistencies, including gibberish text printed on an orange T-shirt, and the distorted facial features of some of the individuals.
After being accused of running an illegal operation, the People's Party hosted a media tour of their offices on February 14.
Footage published by local media shows desks on the fourth floor covered with tarps, with the party saying the floor was undergoing maintenance (archived link).
Pannika Wanich, a spokesperson for the Progressive Movement, said in a separate media tour clip published on YouTube that Spectre C operated on the fifth floor of the building (archived link).
The AI-generated image does not match the footage published by local media.
AFP has previously fact-checked other misinformation stemming from Thailand's recent election.
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