Unmasking Venezuela Victory Footage and AI-Generated Pictures of Maduro.
Synthetic pictures claiming to depict Venezuela's president detained following his apprehension by the United States have amassed many millions of views on social media.
The Way Fake Pictures of the President Surfaced Within Hours
The first fabricated synthetic picture apparently displaying him being escorted off a plane circulated a brief time later. The graphic was unpublished by any verified American sources; it was instead published on the platform X by an account describing itself as an “AI video art enthusiast”.
Our analysis used the SynthID tool, which found the image was created or altered with generative AI.
Further AI-generated images started circulating in the following hours, seemingly depicting additional perspectives of the leader detained. Discernible identifying marks on these images reveal they originated from an Instagram account named ultravfx.
The detection tool says all of these images were similarly generated or edited generative models.
Authentic Image Posted but Fabrications Continued
Donald Trump shared the first real photo of Maduro restrained aboard the US Navy ship on that morning. However, despite this real photo was made public, AI-generated images persisted online but were updated to include the gray sweatsuit worn by Maduro.
Digital forensics reveal these updated fakes were originally uploaded on TikTok by a digital art account. Similarly, SynthID confirms the new graphics were created or altered Google AI.
Important Facts:
- Deepfakes spread rapidly following the news of the president's apprehension.
- The initial fabricated picture was shared on the same day on social media.
- Detection software like AI-watermark detectors helped to confirm the pictures as inauthentic.
- Fabrications continued to spread and evolve despite the publication of real images.
- The origin of several fabricated images was linked to specific online profiles focused on graphic design.
