Analysing AI-manipulated image of Iran protestspublished at 11:04 GMT

11:04 GMT

Thomas Copeland and Ghoncheh Habibiazad
BBC Verify and BBC Persian

We’ve been verifying footage of cost-of-living protests across Iran during the last week which are reported to have claimed the lives of at least six people yesterday.

We’ve also seen some images of real incidents during the protests which appear to have been manipulated using AI being shared online.

One picture shared yesterday by the Israeli foreign ministry’s Persian-language account on X appears to show a police officer spraying water at two men standing close by. Google’s SynthID AI-watermark detector said the image was generated or edited using Google AI.

Two frames from the real footage show the water cannon firing at protesters with the bottom panel showing the AI-manipulated image of a police officer spraying two men with a hose

This picture is based on real, verified footage from the Iranian city of Hamadan showing a police water cannon vehicle spraying protesters in the street.

In the AI-manipulated version a police officer is seen spraying the two men directly from a hose at close range.

We’ve contacted the Israeli foreign ministry for comment.