Decade-old pictures of detained US Navy crew falsely linked to 2026 Iran war

"Iran has captured 10 US Navy personnel, nine men and one woman, and detained them at an Iranian base on Farsi Island," says the Sinhala-language caption of several Facebook images shared on March 14, 2026.

The caption says the capture was reported to the media by Iranian national security chief Ali Larijani -- who was killed in an Israeli strike on March 17 -- but denied by US President Donald Trump (archived link).

The images appear to show US Navy personnel sitting on a carpeted floor, and a grainy photo of patrol boats.

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Screenshot of the false post captured on March 26, 2026, with a red X added by AFP

The same images also circulated in similar Facebook posts after Trump said the US Navy would soon begin escorting tankers through the Strait of Hormuz (archived link).

Trump has also urged other nations to dispatch warships to secure crucial oil supply routes through the waterway (archived link).

Iranian strikes -- part of Tehran's quest to inflict maximum pain on the global economy in retaliation for US-Israeli strikes -- have all but shut the narrow strait through which 20 percent of global crude and liquefied natural gas normally passes (archived link).

While the images circulating on social media do show American sailors detained in Iran, they are from a decade before the latest outbreak of hostilities in the Middle East.

As of March 27 at 0300 GMT, there have been no official reports of US Navy personnel being taken hostage by Iran in relation to the ongoing conflict.

A reverse image search on Google found US broadcaster ABC News published two of the pictures in a report from January 13, 2016 (archived link).

The report is titled, "Iran Releases 10 Navy Sailors Held After Drifting Into Iranian Waters".

Subsequent keyword searches found all of the pictures had previously been distributed by AFP, with captions saying they were handouts released on January 13, 2016 by Sepah News -- the news website and public relations arm of Iran's Revolutionary Guards.

AFP reported at the time that the crew was taken to Iran's Farsi Island after their patrol boats drifted into Iranian territory (archived link). Iran released the sailors after deciding they had not entered Iranian waters intentionally and had no "hostile intent", according to a statement read out on state television.

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Screenshot comparison of the images shared in the false post (L) and the photos distributed by AFP in 2016

Footage of the sailors kneeling with their hands clasped behind their heads, and one of them apologising, however, angered critics of the administration of president Barack Obama as well as US lawmakers (archived link).

AFP has previously debunked a similar false claim about US personnel being captured, as well as other misinformation stemming from the Iran war.