Russia And Ukraine

Are Sám Shevchenko, Samel Hydruskli or Samuel Hydenko the names of any of the suspects in the deadly March 22, 2024, concert hall attack in Moscow, Russia? No, that's not true: In the wake of mass shootings, naming "Sam Hyde" and variations of that name as a shooter is an often-recycled internet meme. It plays on the name of Sam…

Does a viral image show "3 shooters" identified as participants in a terror attack that took place at Crocus City Hall, a major music venue in Moscow, Russia, on March 22, 2024? No, that's not true: The pictures in question are all of one person and date to summer 2023. At the time, Russian pro-Kremlin media citing the Federal Security…

Is this an authentic March, 2024 photo, showing flames billowing behind a President Vladimir Putin re-election billboard that reads "stability" in Russian? No, that's not true: The image was computer-generated, according to tools created to detect AI art. Earlier versions of posts with the picture contained the kinds of anomalies that are common to AI-generated images. The claim appeared in…

Did U.S. Marines arrest U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland and her husband, Robert Kagan? No, that's not true: A Pentagon duty officer told Lead Stories that the information in this claim is "false." This claim also appears on a website that regularly publishes fabricated content. The claim appeared in an article (archived here) published by…

Did Tucker Carlson say in Russian that Biden was planning a "terrible crime" against Russia on March 7, 2024? No, that's not true: In the original video of Carlson taken from his social media account for a post on X, he does not mention President Joe Biden or a threat against Russia. The text in the post on X does…

Did Alexi Navalny's mother Lyudmila publicly accuse the politician's widow Yulia Navalnaya of capitalizing on her son's death? No, that's not true: The purported "address" is an AI-generated fake. Its origin can be traced to a network of Kremlin state-funded propaganda resources. The claim appeared in a post (archived here) on X, formerly known as Twitter, on February 22, 2024.…

Did Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau say that Russia must win this war? Yes: Trudeau did misspeak at the end of a news conference in Poland. While speaking of how aid and military equipment would be supplied to Ukraine, he accidentally said "Russia must win this war." He immediately corrected himself and said, "Ukraine must win this war against Russia."…

Does a post on social media that claims the HAARP ionospheric heater is all over the world show an authentic photo of one? No, that's not true: It's a photo of a long-abandoned Soviet-era radar in Ukraine. Before the 2022 Russian full-scale invasion, the area, which had been evacuated due to high radiation levels after the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, was…

Did France 24 report that French President Emmanuel Macron cancelled a visit to Ukraine over fears of an assassination attempt? No, that's not true: France 24 debunked the claim. The video purporting to show the network report the news is a deepfake, generated by AI. The claim appeared in a post (archived here) on X, formerly known as Twitter, on…

Does a video clip shared by the official account of the State of Israel show 23,000 tons of tents and shelter equipment that were trucked into Gaza since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023? No, that's not true: This is a stock video clip that shows a refugee camp in Palanca, Moldova which was uploaded to iStock…