TOKYO \u2013 A Japanese town deleted a social media post warning of a bear sighting after discovering that a picture it had received showing the fearsome creature was AI-generated. <\/p>\n
Similar fake images have been circulating online as fear of bears runs high in the country, where the animals have killed a record 13 people in 2025.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe town prioritised informing residents to avoid danger, but we apologise for causing any anxiety or confusion,\u201d the northern town of Onagawa said on its official X account on Nov 26.<\/p>\n
The image created with artificial intelligence showed a bear roaming around a residential area at night.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will take this experience as a lesson, and will strive to improve the accuracy and speed of our future information dissemination,\u201d the town said.<\/p>\n
But residents still \u201cneed to continue exercising utmost caution regarding bear sightings\u201d.<\/p>\n
An official in Onagawa told AFP on Nov 27 that the town had received the bear picture from a well-meaning company president on the morning of Nov 26.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere had been reports of a bear sighting in a different district of the town over the weekend, that we warned of over disaster prevention radio, so we didn\u2019t have much doubt\u201d about the image, he said.<\/p>\n
The town posted the image on X quickly on the morning of Nov 26, because the alleged sighting was near a nursery school, the official said.<\/p>\n
Schoolchildren in the town were told to commute in a group or use school buses, while nursery school preschool children refrained from playing outside. <\/p>\n
At the same time, \u201cwe were checking with different apps if the image was genuine or fake\u201d, said the official, who requested anonymity. <\/p>\n
\u201cOne analysis showed the possibility was high that it was AI-generated, while the other said the possibility of AI was low,\u201d he said, highlighting the difficulty of spotting increasingly realistic-looking AI images.<\/p>\n
It emerged that the image was originally created by a company employee for fun, but one of his colleagues believed it was real and reported it to the boss.<\/p>\n
The town retracted its post with the image on the afternoon on Nov 26, after being contacted by the person who created the AI image, the official said.<\/p>\n