AI-generated Iran images are widespread. How do we know what to believe? | Margaret Sullivan

TThe videos look authentic – and they’re spreading like wildfire on social media. For example, one shows Iranian missiles exploding at the airport in Tel Aviv, Israel. Another shows US soldiers being held at gunpoint by the Iranian military.

They are not real, but – often created using cutting-edge AI – they are completely misleading. They may be exposed, but somehow that doesn’t change anything.

“New fakes are popping up faster than they can be eliminated,” as CNN fact-checking reporter Daniel Dale put it, describing the aforementioned fakes — just two of so many — in detail.

Meanwhile, legitimate photos and images, even from reliable news sources, can be branded as fake or suspicious. In some cases, this is a way to create doubt and make people take the grim reality of war less seriously and treat death and destruction as just another video game.

The New York Times was forced to speak out this week after an organization online alleged that…