how not to be fooled by the images circulating on social networks?

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Beware of manipulation. Since the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine by Russian armed forces on Thursday, February 24, photos and videos of the conflict have been published. quickly shared on social networks. But some of these images are sometimes taken out of context or even staged for propaganda purposes.

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To protect yourself from false information, franceinfo gives you the basic reflexes you need to accept before sharing videos or photos related to the war in Ukraine.

1Read the text and comments that accompany this content

Before participating in the dissemination of information, video or photo on social networks, the first instinct should be to read the accompanying text. A title can sometimes be misunderstood or deliberately misleading. Therefore, reading the entire content makes it possible to better assess the accuracy of the information.

Good reflex too: read the comments. Sometimes they make it possible to find the original photo or video, and certain messages posted by people present when the images were taken can give more details about their context. In addition, fact-checking by Internet users experienced in OSINT (open source intelligence) is sometimes hidden in comments of misleading content. Thus, this answer from an American journalist* to a photo shared on Twitter reveals that the photo, which shows two children in front of Ukrainian tanks, is actually from 2016.

After these first checks are made, if you decide to broadcast the video or photo in turn, prefer to share the original post. Also think Donbornr contextual elements so that your message is not misinterpreted.

2 Identify the source behind the images

The source of information is also a good indicator of its reliability. If not explicitly mentioned or difficult to identify, great care is required. In fact, many videos circulate on social media through content aggregators that pick them up and distribute them on their behalf without checking them systematically. Therefore, it is better to be careful with this type of source, especially if the images are sensational.

The ideal is to refer to accounts known and considered serious. These are, for example, specialist journalists (such as the great reporters of France Télévisions, who are in Ukraine), leaders, heads of institutions, experts, etc.

Most of these accounts benefit from Twitter certification (the little blue badge next to the name), which should guarantee their authenticity. However, this indicator does not always guarantee the accuracy of the information disseminated. So the Belarusian media NEXTA, which broadcasts a large number of photos and amateur videos on social media, was fixed in late February for sharing a fake front page of the American magazine Time.

The news site that self-identifies on Twitter as “The largest media in Eastern Europe“but benefits from Twitter certification. The misleading post is still online, but NEXTA posted a correction in the comments on its own tweet.

Be careful with photos and videos of the war in Ukraine, broadcast on social networks from shared accounts, even entertainment. “As a restaurant that makes pancakes, sushi and burgers at the same time, quality may not be available.” explains Lin-Lan Dao from the inspection department Les Révélateurs on FranceTV. Honeyload Media has it this way shared on Twitter* An image of a child standing up to a soldier, which actually shows a Palestinian protester facing an Israeli soldier in 2012.

3Check the date of issue of the document …

Identifying a source and assessing its reliability is a good first step, but it does not guarantee that the video or photo is not taken out of context. eMany images are shared on social media with captions that pretend to be related to the war in Ukraine. But they actually date from earlier events.

A practical case with this photo, posted on Twitter, showing Ukrainians praying on their knees in the snow. A quick reverse search of images on the site TinyEye shows that the first appearance of this frame dates back to 2019. Long before the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

On the left, a post shared on Twitter on February 21, 2022. On the right, the same photo published in 2019, found thanks to a reverse image search on TinyEye. (Screenshots by TWITTER AND TINYYE)

That’s why a good reflex to take to verify the authenticity of a photo or video is to make sure you don’t has already been published in the past. To do this, it is possible to perform a reverse image search. This tool, available in most search engines, makes it possible to identify all image occurrences on the web. If Photoor videos presented as recent appear in results that are months or years old, so their use is certainly misleading.

It is also possible to install the InVid plug-in on your browser to perform a reverse image search by right-clicking on an image found on social networks. This validation tool also allows you to analyze videos based on key images to find their previous appearances on the web.

4… and its geographical origin

Some photos or videos are presented as taken in Ukraine, while related to conflicts in other regions of the world. To spot them, you need to find a few clues. Identifying the language spoken or written on elements present in the image (such as signs or posters) can raise awareness.

If a place is explicitly mentioned in the caption of the image or in its geolocation, a small tour of Google Maps can make it possible to check if the action is really in that place. However, be careful with changes in the landscape over time if the photo or video was taken a few years ago.

With these tricks, we were able to spot videos of the explosion of the port of Beirut in August 2020, which were spread on social networks and are misrepresented as images of the war in Ukraine.

The explosion in the port of Beirut, which occurred in August 2020, was presented as a bomb attack in Ukraine in a Facebook post on February 24, 2022 (FACEBOOK SCREENING)

5Get information from fact-finding units

The war also includes communication on social networks. Russia broadcasts staged videos there to justify its invasion of Ukraine. But the camp across the street sometimes also shares false information. The Ministry Ukrainian of Defense thus posted on Twitter, Friday, February 25, a video showing a Russian plane shot down by Ukrainian forces. These are actually images from the video game. Digital combat simulator, as shown a BBC reporter*.

Therefore, the institutional reports of the armed forces on the ground are not always reliable. This tweet from the Ukrainian Ministry is still online, but on a social network signal in a warning message that “this medium does not match the context”referring to dcheck items from Reuters Fact Check * and AP Fact Check *.

This is really one of the resources to keep in mind in case of doubt about the content: cIn recent years, press agencies, like most major media outlets, have set up image verification units. Photos and videos submitted by these accounts are systematically verified before they are published. In September 2021, France Télévisions opened its own inspection unit, The FranceTV Revealers. You can follow them on Twitter to catch up on photos of the war in Ukraine that are being spread on social media.

In summary, if you come across a suspicious photo, video or statement on social media, it is a good reflex to consult the sites or Twitter pages of the fact-checking cells (AFP Facteur, Checknews, Info or Intox and, of course, True or False ). An article on the subject may have already been written. In this case, you can share this article on social media in response to the misleading post to inform other Internet users.

If no verification has already taken place, you can contact the various editors and ask them your question. To warn journalists about our True or Fake section, do not hesitate to write to them via franceinfo live. Attention, don’t forget to put the link to the post leading to the photo or video!

* Links marked with asterisks refer to the content in English.