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Did the Russian cities of Vyborg, Petrozavodsk, and Murmansk decide with an overwhelming majority vote to leave Russia and join Finland? No, that's not true: This fictional multipart story is illustrated with an AI-generated image of "unidentified militants" and a fictional map of "Greater Finland". The fake news narrative is a twist on an idea from the early 1900s regarding…

Does a photo spread virally on social media show Tyler Robinson, the suspect in the assassination of Charlie Kirk? No, that's not true: This is a photo of Jack Bellows, a cochair of the Salt Lake Democratic Socialists. During the manhunt for the person who shot Charlie Kirk, someone suggested Bellows might be the person of interest who appeared in…

Did Vogue magazine publish an article on March 21, 2025, with the headline "Disney Confirms Russian Troll Farms At Heart of Bad Snow White Opening Weekend"? No, that's not true: a fake screenshot shared online was the result of digital manipulation, and used a different Vogue article as its basis. The fake screenshot attributed the invented headline to a non-existent…

Did USAID pay Nintendo of America over $9 million "to promote the inclusion of adults in children's media, to study infantilism and the Peter Pan Syndrome"? No, that's not true: The image circulating on social media is fake. A search of the website usaspending.gov does not show any such payment to Nintendo of America Inc. The fabricated image resembling official…

Was Ghislaine Maxwell, the socialite associated with sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, dead as of November 14, 2024? No, that's not true: She was listed as an inmate at a federal prison at the time of writing. There is no evidence that Maxwell was deceased on or before this date. The claim was suggested in a post (archived here) on X…

Did "leaked reports" say George Soros paid ABC moderators $1 million each to fact check Donald Trump during the September 10, 2024, presidential debate? No, that's not true: The story came from a website whose satire disclaimer reads: "These articles are meant to be humorous and are often entirely made up." No credible evidence of "leaked reports" or such payments…

Did a photo of the attempted assassin of Donald Trump surface, showing that Thomas Matthew Crooks was transgender? No, that's not true: The person in the photo on social media is not Crooks. The photo appeared first on 4chan, posted by an anonymous user who replied to someone's questioning its truth that "spreading rumors is fun." A close-up photo of…

Did U.S. Secret Service "top brass" refuse to give a sniper named Jonathan Willis permission to shoot the would-be assassin at the July 13, 2024, Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania -- as an anonymous post on 4chan claimed? No, that's not true: A statement from the U.S. Secret Service Communications and Media Relations Office called this claim categorically false. The…

Does an authentic photo of Claudia Sheinbaum, recently elected to be president of Mexico, bear an uncanny resemblance to the antisemitic "Happy Merchant" meme caricature? No, that's not true: The image was digitally manipulated to introduce some unflattering details that were not present in the original photo -- notably altering Sheinbaum's profile and changing the position of her neck. The…

Does a topless photo show New York Attorney General Letitia James? No, that's not true: This photo does not show James, but Stacey Plaskett, the U.S. delegate to Congress from the Virgin Islands, who was a victim of cybercrime. Two disgruntled ex-staffers pleaded guilty to federal cyber-related charges and were sentenced in 2018 for hacking her phone and disclosing private…