Special issue: Israel-Hamas news tips

False claim that CNN ‘staged’ war report uses altered audio

NO: The audio track in this video clip of a CNN report about a rocket attack near the Israel-Gaza border — which captures a voice supposedly from a studio telling reporter Clarissa Ward to “try to look nice and scared” — is not from the original footage. YES: This fake audio was digitally inserted into the clip to propagate the false claim that CNN staged the attack. YES: The genuine clip was broadcast live and shows Ward and her team taking cover from an actual barrage of Hamas rockets.

NewsLit takeaway: Conspiracy theorists and other purveyors of disinformation often attempt to discredit legitimate news outlets to explain away inconvenient facts or to direct people to websites and online communities where false and misleading claims proliferate. This fake CNN video is an example of impostor content, which is inauthentic information shared to look like the real thing. In this case, the impostor content is pushing the conspiratorial notion that news reports are often staged to manipulate the public. The goal here is twofold: First, to discredit the news network, and second, to cast doubt about contemporary events.

Doctored audio can be harder to detect than manipulated video. Comparing viral content to the original source is the best way to root out these fakes, but people should also check out the nature of the accounts pushing a particular video. This manipulated video, for example, was widely shared by accounts with a track record of amplifying conspiracy theories with false and doctored content. By filtering these accounts out of our feeds, we can lessen our chances of encountering these types of harmful claims.

Flood of falsehoods spreads after Hamas surprise attack

NO: The videos in these posts do not show a baby Jewish girl with a Hamas terrorist, militants parachuting into Israel, Jewish children in cages who were kidnapped before being sold or a series of explosions in Gaza. YES: These videos were all published online before the current series of attacks and are circulating out of context on social media alongside these false claims. NO: The White House did not release a memo authorizing $8 billion in aid to Israel. YES: The alleged memo is a doctored version of an authentic memo from July 25 authorizing $400 million in aid to Ukraine. NO: This video does not show Palestinians shooting down Israeli fighter jets. YES: This video was taken from the video game Arma 3.

NewsLit takeaway: Breaking news stories, especially those involving widespread devastation or controversial topics, are regularly followed by waves of disinformation as bad actors attempt to capitalize on the public’s attention to get cheap engagement online, as well as sow divisive narratives and advance ideological goals. While the specific claims change from one event to the next, the tactics are consistent: Videos and images from old and unrelated events, or even from realistic video games, are repurposed and shared out of context, and statements from world leaders are fabricated.

The widespread prevalence of these falsehoods creates a distorted view of current events that may influence and alter a person’s global perspective. For this reason, it is important to be especially diligent during breaking news events.