The ClarityDesk
Written by Gabriel Garang Garang
A viral Facebook image claiming that a police officer kneeled before the South Sudan presidential special envoy is AI-generated.
The image was re-published by Gatkuoth Top, Deng Bol Aruai, Muoch Thurbil, Tearz Ayuen, and Voice of Juba Facebook accounts, which claim a police officer has kneeled before the South Sudan Presidential Special Envoy.
“Why did this police officer kneel while greeting Adut salva Kiir who is not even a military officer?” The caption of the photo reads as posted on Facebook.
Debunking the Claim:
A Google reverse image search, a way of looking for the history of how often a photo has been used online returned several results.
One, specific result points to a video (archived) posted by a user on X (formerly Twitter) showing the man in the photo, Mawien Kem Akoon, a police officer and singer who knelt during a live performance of a song dedicated to Adut Salva Kiir, South Sudan Presidential Special Envoy.
When the photo was uploaded to Hive moderation, an AI-Generated Content Detection software, the result shows that the image is generated by AI.
Hot in Juba (archived) and Citizen Voice Media (archived) have also debunked the claim to be fake and attached the real photo from the event at the Directorate of Nationality, Passports and Immigration office.
Our Verdict:
The ClarityDesk finds the viral image, where a police officer allegedly kneeled before the presidential special envoy, to be AI-generated hence digitally altered.
This article is published by The ClarityDesk, with the support of the Election Civic Tech Fund of AfricTivistes, within the AHEAD Africa and Digitalise Youth projects, led by the Digital Democracy Initiative.
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