Iran’s state media outlets have significantly increased disinformation efforts, including alleged battlefield victories which are supported by old or manipulated images, according to a report.
Since the United States and Israel launched attacks on Iran on 28 February, 18 war-related claims by Iran were found to be false, according to the news rating organisation NewsGuard.
In contrast, five other false claims published by Iranian sources were identified in the two weeks before the US-Israel attack on Iran.
NewsGuard also found that Iranian outlets are increasingly turning to AI-doctored images to spread false claims. In many cases, these images are created outside Iran.
Iranian state-controlled news service Tehran Times published a satellite image which allegedly reflected the destruction of a US radar at Qatar’s Al-Udeid Air Base in a post on social media platform X on 28 February. The picture showed the site before and after the supposed attack.
“An American radar in Qatarwas completely destroyed today in an Iranian drone strike,” the post wrote.
However, information warfare analyst Tal Hagin later dispelled these claims by highlighting that this was originally a Google Earth image from 2 February 2025, which was manipulated by AI.
“One way to tell is that all the cars stayed in the exact same location,” Hagin notedin his X post.
Iranian state-linked sources also shared a video which claimed to be of a fighter jet being shot down...
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