An AI generated photograph of fugitive business tycoon Vijay Mallya dining with Congress leader Supriya Shrinate has surfaced as real on social media.
The Claim
Several verified X users shared the picture as a real one, fuelling speculation about the connection between Mallya and the Congress leader. One such user posted the photo with the caption, "Golmal He Sab Golmal . Sab Mile He Hain."
Click here to view the post and here for an archive.
What We Found: Photo Is Generated Using AI
1. Watermark Of Grok AI: On closely examining the photo, we noticed a watermark labelled 'Grok' at the bottom right corner. Grok is the AI chatbot developed by xAI and integrated into the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter. It can generate artificial images, which typically feature a similar watermark.
2. AI Detection Tools Confirm Photo Is Fake: We tested the image using AI detection tools like Was It AI and Hive Moderation, and both conclusively identified it as AI-generated. Hive Moderation indicated a 99% likelihood that the image contains AI-generated or deepfake content. Similarly, Was It AI stated, "We are quite confident that this image, or a significant part of it, was created by AI."