Pro-regime Iranians flocked to see the body of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as it lay in state in early July. Khamenei was killed on February 28 during the first days of a bombing campaign on Iran carried out by the United States and Israel.
The authorities said that several million Iranians attended the funeral, though these numbers can’t be independently verified.
While many people did attend the funeral, as shown by photos taken by international media outlets, fake images of the event have also been circulating online.
A massive crowd at the Grand Mosalla Mosque?
A social media user who often expresses support for the Iranian regime posted a video on July 4 showing an enormous crowd on the grounds of the Grande Mosalla Mosque, an important religious and political site in Tehran, where the supreme leader’s body lay in state. The video garnered more than 370,000 views on X.
While the building in the video does in some ways resemble the Grand Mosalla Mosque, with its rows of arcades along the sides and a cupola flanked by two minarets, it also has several key differences – the first clue that the image was generated by AI.
The first key difference is that, in the video shared online, the Grand Mosalla’s dome looks beige-coloured, while it is actually blue in a video of the site filmed by FRANCE 24 on July 4. Moreover, there is a large arch located between the building’s two minarets, framing the dome. In the video posted online, this structure is missing.
A massive crowd near Azadi Tower?
Other pro-Khamenei social media users shared an image they said showed the crowd who attended ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s funeral gathered in front of another important Tehran monument, the Azadi Tower. This image garnered more than 100,000 views across a number of different X posts. It was also picked up and used by a number of African media outlets.
However, this image was also generated by AI. SynthID, ChatGPT’s tool for detecting AI-generated images, revealed that the image contains a watermark indicating that it was produced by ChatGPT’s artificial image generator.
The photo generated by AI has several key differences when compared with a satellite image of Azadi Square, where the tower is located, posted by the site Soar and captured on July 6.
First of all, the AI-generated image shows what looks like two rows of trees near the square’s exits. However, there is no sign of these trees in the satellite image.
The satellite image also shows that there are no buildings towards the south of the square, while there seems to be a row of buildings in the AI-generated image.
Did a dissident rapper really attend the funeral?
Another image of the funeral was shared by members of the opposition who support Reza Pahlavi, the son of the late Shah of Iran. This image garnered more than 234,000 views on X.
The image appears to show rapper Toomaj Salehi, a dissident who has been threatened by the regime, being interviewed by Fars, a news agency closely linked to the Iranian regime. In the image, the dissident rapper stands in the crowd carrying a flag of the Islamic Republic of Iran, making it appear that he betrayed the opposition and, instead, honoured the supreme leader during his funeral.
However, if you run this image through ChatGPT’s AI-detection tool SynthID, it shows that the image was, in fact, generated by ChatGPT.
Moreover, if you look at the microphone that Salehi is holding, you’ll see that the letters on it aren’t in Persian. They are completely illegible – a tell-tale sign for AI, which still struggles to generate text.
This post could be linked to splits within the Iranian opposition between those who are pro- and anti- Reza Pahlavi, apparent in the comments on the X post featuring the image. Salehi, who opposes the regime, also isn’t a supporter of the monarchy, which has resulted in criticism from those who favour the Shah’s eldest son.
This article has been translated from the original in French by Brenna Daldorph.
This story originally appeared on France24
