Fact-Check Dispatch: Robert De Niro rants at protesters, RTÉ on funding for Ukrainian pets, and Space in a Hollywood basement
Issue 3 of the Spotlight Fact-Check Dispatch
Spotlight is a newsletter created by Eurovision News in collaboration with Members of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). It aims to combat misinformation and promote fact-checking efforts in Europe. The newsletter serves as a platform to showcase the fact-checking work of European public service media broadcasters.
Video purporting to be of Cyclone Hidaya hitting Tanzania is old and altered
A video was posted to Facebook purporting to show Cyclone Hidaya, which was forecast to hit Tanzania, barreling into the country with a terrifying-looking tornado accompanied by lightning strikes.
The video was posted on May 4 by a user describing themselves as living in Kenya, where warnings about the storm had been issued as it was expected to bring heavy rain. Cyclone Hidaya was forecast to make landfall in Tanzania on May 4 as a moderate tropical storm after tracking across the Indian Ocean.
To determine whether this video is one of those the user had edited, a search for images using the caption brought us to this Adobe stock shot video uploaded by a user named Gabriel, which shows the same location, but without the tornado and accompanying lightning strikes.
A search for images using a screenshot of the Adobe video brought us to this YouTube video posted on October 8, 2016, by an account calling themselves “Tornado trackers .”
Video purporting to show Robert De Niro shouting at pro-Palestine protesters is actually from Netflix project
A clip of Robert De Niro went viral on social media this week, showing the actor shouting as a crowd was gathered around him: “This is not a movie. This is real. Right now you gotta listen, you gotta work, you gotta get that job done.”
Pro-Israel accounts shared the clip widely, like this one that was shared on X on May 1 and was viewed over 250,000 times.
Representatives for Netflix and Robert De Niro told USA TODAY that he was rehearsing for his role in Zero Day, a Netflix political thriller series that is currently in production.
Images captured on location while a crew was filming Zero Day in New York City can be found in the Getty Images library, where Robert De Niro is wearing the same clothing as seen in the clip.
Series of images showing ‘faked’ moon landing were AI-generated
A number of posts on social media included images of what appeared to be a film set where astronauts were apparently staging the moon landing, with a caption alluding to man’s first walk on the moon having been ‘faked’.
The post first appeared on the X account “DR. Kek,” which has over half a million followers and frequently posts unverified health claims and other material popular among online conspiracy theory communities. The caption's formatting follows the usual style for this account, with capital letters and distinctive text spacing.
The comments on the post in the subreddit reveal more information. Users joked about how the creation could fuel conspiracy theorists who believe the moon landing was staged, and the uploader wrote that their goal in making conspiracy-related images was actually “mocking the conspiracy theorists”.
They also gave more information about how they made the image. “I tried a first one with a ChatGPT-made prompt that was super specific, but not as good. This final one actually was as simple as it could be. All I told it was a film set of the moon landing, with astronauts, cameras, and producers, shot on a 1969 camera. Blown away, as usual!”
Protesters did not replace U.S. flag with Palestinian flags during protests at Harvard University
The video and two still images were posted to an account on X and had a displayed view count of 2.7 million along with the claim that the protesters had “replaced” the U.S. flag outside the university hall.
Conservative activist and podcast host Graham Allen also shared the video, which was viewed 5.4 million times with the caption “They’re making a mockery of Harvard.”
According to a report from Harvard’s student newspaper The Harvard Crimson, three Palestinian flags were raised between 6 p.m. and 6:23 p.m. before being quickly lowered, meaning they were not raised at a time the U.S. flag would have been flying.
Harvard University confirmed this in their statement, saying that the “American flag was not flying on University Hall at the time the other flags were raised” before adding that the “flags raised by protesters over University Hall were removed by Harvard facilities staff.”
Purported screenshot from RTÉ website about government funding for Ukrainian pets is not genuine
An image purportedly from the RTÉ News website shows an image of a dog lounging on a pool float under a headline saying “Government signs off on another €150 million allocation for Ukrainian pet welfare.”
The screenshot looks like an article from the RTÉ News website, and bears a headline about government funding of Ukrainian pet welfare and an image of a dog floating in a pool. The article was purportedly published on April 17, 2024, according to the image.
There was also no evidence that an article outlining the supposed measures was ever published on the RTÉ website. Furthermore, the purported screenshot features a full stop after the headline, which is not in keeping with the usual style on RTÉ News.