Fake Photos Go Viral: Doctored pics make blood boil
What’s real and what’s not?
Is the photo of the “Latinos for Trump” construction worker getting arrested by ICE agents last week a fake? How about the photo of the burly ICE agent manhandling a young girl in what appears to be a public school classroom?
In today’s world, thanks to AI and desktop publishing, distinguishing between the two, real and phony, just got that much harder.
First came Adobe’s Photoshop, where a good graphic artist could make anything look real — Robert DeNiro in drag.
Now comes AI, where a recent German photographer, Boris Eldagsen, won a first-place prize using artificial intelligence, before revealing that his winning photo wasn’t real at all, but instead, was the sole product of AI.
“AI images and photography should not compete with each other in an award like this,” said the German artist. “They are different entities. AI is not photography. Therefore I will not accept the award.” (Source: Telegraph.co.uk.)
Probably a pretty good idea, because based on Boris’s photo, real photographs will have a hard time competing against AI.
Photos Meant to Anger
As the old saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words, pointing to the power of visual communication and its ability to convey complex ideas and emotions in a way that words can’t always capture.
The two doctored photos accompanying this story look very real, and they were produced with the intent of invoking either fear or anger among the populace. Black, white, brown, red, yellow, doesn’t matter the color of our skin. Any of us who sees a federal agent manhandling a child is going to feel some degree of outrage, hostility toward the establishment.
That happened during the Clinton years when federal agents went to assume custody of a young Cuban boy, 5-year-old Elian Gonzalez, who had been found floating in an inner tube three miles off the coast of Ft. Lauderdale after a boat carrying refugees, including his mother, sank.
His father back in Cuba, who had no clue that his exwife was taking his son on a dangerous trip across the Florida Strait, demanded that U.S. federal authorities send him back home. Not only that, but both his maternal grandmother and paternal grandmother flew to the U.S. to seek their grandson’s return to Cuba.
The Republicans in the U.S. House said they didn’t have the votes to pass a law that would give the boy U.S. citizenship. Meanwhile, U.S. AG Janet Reno and Bill Clinton, not to mention a federal judge, decided that the father retained parental rights.
The boy’s family in Miami put up a fight, refused to surrender the boy, and right or wrong, Reno sent federal agents into their home to remove the fiveyear- old from the premises. The family had indicated they were willing to put up a fight, so the agents were armed.
An AP photog was on hand and shot a photo that went viral, across print and broadcast media, given that social media really wasn’t in full swing, or no swing at all, in 2000.
Besides, the photograph was sourced. It was clear that an Associated Press camera man was on site when the deal went down.
Different Story Today
Today, it’s a different story. A photo, unsourced, can go viral, and before you know it, it’s spread across the web, invoking anger, hostility, in people who see it.
Even if one is in favor of increased border security, the deportation of dangerous felons, seeing what appears to be a federal agent manhandling a young girl who is clearly distraught, crying, in a school setting, will create questions – how is this happening?
Turns out, it’s not. There are no cases of any girl being dragged out of an American school today. Nor are there any valid reports of ICE agents going on to a school’s property anywhere in the U.S. to take anyone into custody, student, teacher, or custodian.
The other photo floating through the internet ether last week appeared ironic.
Two ICE agents leading what appears to be a construction worker from a job site. He’s wearing a work vest, but on the back, reads: Latinos for Trump.
The irony.
As with the other photo, this one was doctored as well.
One can simply do an online search for “Construction worker, ICE, Latinos forTrump.”
Click “enter,” and up pops a Reuters story — “Fact Check: Picture of man detained in immigration raid ...”
The wire story begins with this paragraph:
“A photo from 2018 showing a man being led away by agents of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) was altered to include a t-shirt message of support for President Donald Trump.”
The other photo, with the poor little girl in tears, is also easy to discount. Simply type this into any online search engine: “School girl, ICE, photograph,” and up pops a news story courtesy of Yahoo. com: “Recently, images depicting Immigration and Customs Enforcements (ICE) agents seizing a little girl have gone viral across social media platforms including Facebook, X, Instagram, and Threads.”
The photo, without being sourced, evoked outrage, as related in the Yahoo.com news story:
John Pavolovitz, an activist and former pastor, shared the image on Facebook. “We cannot accept this,” he said. “People who hurt/ cause trauma to kids are evil,” posted an account on Threads with more than 20,000 followers, “Liberals are cool,” along with the image. “This evil runs deep in MAGA paternalism.” The X account “Republicans Against MAGA” tweeted the image, adding, “Christians ok with this?”
Trouble was, the former paster didn’t take but a simple minute to do his due diligence before passing on the altered photo. If he didn’t want to search for the story online, he could have gone to Snopes.com, which is an online fact-checking source that anyone can use.
Even today, how many people know that both photos are fake, with the help of AI-generation tools available to anyone, and/or a graphic software program like Adobe, which costs money, or similar programs that can be had at no cost?
The man behind the photo of the girl in the hands of an ICE agent told Yahoo.com how he did it:
The proprietor of the X account “Live on the Chat,” a man named Roberto, told The Dispatch Fact Check that he generated the photo in a prompt on X’s built-in AI tool, Grok (which can be had for free). The user then tweeted the image in multiple posts, including one he captioned, “So cruel to target children.” Roberto also confirmed to Snopes, another fact-checking outlet, that he created the image.
It only takes less than a minute to verify a story these days, a photo, and yet, few people seem interested in doing it.
If it fits their narrative and serves a purpose, it gets passed on via social media platforms.
Like anything else, some argue, social media, AI, they have their pros and their cons.
Meanwhile, legit newspapers, which source their photos, continue to shrink in number. In 2024 alone, 127 newspapers shut down.
Since 2005, the number of newspapers in the U.S. has declined by approximately a third. (Source: Dreier Roundtable.)
Working to fill that void, online stories, photos, that can’t be vetted.