AI-Generated Photos of Giant Fishes Mislead Cambodian Social Media Users
In recent months, many old photos have been circulated on social media. One of them is photos showing mysterious animals uploaded on social media last month with a clam saying they were mysterious fishes living along the Mekong River 150 years ago, but all were already extinct. The photos had been widely shared across social media platforms. By running Google Reverse Image Search, however, we found the claim is misleading.
SOCIAL MEDIA CLAIM
Nineteen black-and-white photos showing a group of people standing next to giant fishes were uploaded on social media last month. The photos came with a claim saying the creatures were mysterious fishes living along the Mekong River 150 years ago, but already extinct.
The post was widely shared, commented on, and reacted to by social media across platforms including Khmer-speaking social media users.
Below is the capture of the viral claim saying “Crocodile tooth fish were found 150 years ago along the Mekong River, but they are all extinct. The Mekong River is in East Asia and is the world’s twelfth longest river over 3000 miles”។
Below is also the capture of the post in Khmer language saying “140 years ago, there were these kinds of fishes along our Mekong River, but they are extinct today. What happened in the past?”
The same claim in Khmer language was also circulated by other Facebook users. Please see the circulation of the full claim here 1 (archived), 2 (archived), and 3 (archived).
Below is the capture of the claim in Laos language: “These pictures are hard to find, but lucky to see.”
The same claim was also tweeted on Twitter in Japanese language saying: “A crocodile tooth fish was discovered along the Mekong River 150 years ago, but has since gone extinct.”
FACT CHECK
Fact Crescendo Cambodia began checking the photos by running Google Reverse Image Search which led us to find out the facts below.
The photos were uploaded in Midjourney Official group by Facebook user named ธตรัฐ ไตรณรงค์ on April 09, 2023.
Below is the capture of the post saying: “Cause of Extinction, Mekong River between the border of Thailand and Laos …”
Fact Crescendo Cambodia could not verify if the Midjourney Official is the official Facebook group of the Midjourney team.
Fact Crescendo Cambodia has tried to get the details from the social media user ธตรัฐ ไตรณรงค์, but he yet replied to our inquiry. We will update later if the Facebook user replies.
However, we found many photos generated by artificial intelligent technology were shared in the Facebook group, including doctored photos of world leaders and celebrities.
Below is the capture of the AI-generated photos of late Queen Elizabeth II playing music instruments shared in the group on April 29, 2023.
សន្និដ្ឋាន
Fact Crescendo Cambodia found the post of the photos mentioned above is misleading. The photos of giant fishes were generated by artificial intelligent technology. They are not mysterious creatures living along the Mekong River 150 years ago.
Title:AI-Generated Photos of Giant Fishes Mislead Cambodian Social Media Users
Fact Check By: Jay UdomResult: Misleading
