Does a viral picture of U.K. police officers appearing to kneel to a group of men in traditional Islamic clothes portray a real-life scene? No, that's not true: Three AI detectors said the image was generated using AI. The image showed classic indicators of that such as missing body parts and unnaturally positioned limbs.
The image reappeared in a post (archived here) on X, formerly known as Twitter, on September 3, 2024. It said:
The United Kingdom has fallen...
May God save and protect the good people of Britain.
This is what the post looked like on X at the time of writing:
(Source: X screenshot taken on Wed Sep 4 13:52:14 2024 UTC)
The image started to circulate online on August 15, 2024. The now-deleted post on X that shared the picture for the first time was published under the caption:
How AI sees London.
Manual analysis of the image reveals multiple discrepancies strongly suggesting that it was AI-generated. A policeman standing on the left has pointing fingers from both hands conjoined. One kneeling officer is missing his head and another one's leg is unnaturally bent. On the right side of the picture, a man wearing traditional Muslim clothes has an unnaturally shaped thumb, and a kneeling officer appears to be missing a foot.
The composite image below -- with increased exposure for better visibility of the issues -- demonstrates some of the discrepancies (click to view a larger version of it):
(Source: X screenshot taken on Wed Sep 4 13:52:14 2024 UTC; composite image by Lead Stories)
AI-detection tools Illuminarty and HuggingFace determined that the image was not authentic:
(Source: Illuminarty screenshot taken on Wed Sep 4 14:09:58 2024 UTC)
(Source: HuggingFace screenshot taken on Wed Sep 4 14:00:14 2024 UTC)
Additionally, TrueMedia found substantial evidence of the generative AI presence here (archived here).
The same claim was reviewed by FullFact, Logically, NewsMeter, Radio Free Asia and Misbar.
The U.K. saw a massive spike in false viral claims promoting anti-immigrant sentiment immediately after the July 29, 2024, Southport stabbing (archived here) that left three children dead. The spread of disinformation was one of the major contributing factors that led (archived here) to a series of riots (archived here) across the country.
Other Lead Stories fact checks about the U.K. can be found here.
