Online investigation. How to check the authenticity of a video

Fake videos in the media and social networks have long become commonplace. Over the past month alone, at least a dozen of such fakes have been widely discussed - supposedly Polish troops entering Ukraine, the flight of Vladimir Zelensky from Kiev, and much more. This time, under the heading "Online Investigation ", we will tell you how to check the video yourself and figure out whether it is a fake or not.

🔎 Most of the investigative journalism is based on open data. On weekends, in the "Online Investigation" section, we talk about online investigation methods available to everyone. With their help, you can check any questionable information - this is not only interesting, but also useful. Write to our investigator Irina Pankratova (@pirara in Telegram) what information you would like to learn how to search and verify.

Dealing with the authenticity of the video is not always easy: for example, the widely discussed video of the "abandoned" mobilized in the Belgorod region has not been accurately verified. However, with a set of online tools, you can understand how suspicious a video is and draw conclusions about whether it can be trusted.

Tools: bots, plugins, websites

- You can find the original source of the video using the service of the international public organization for the protection of human rights Amnesty International Youtube Data Viewer . You need to add a hyperlink to a YouTube video in the search bar. It will be divided into freeze frames - they can be used, for example, to search by pictures in Yandex. Based on these freeze frames, the service will show all the same videos, among which there will be the first uploaded one.

- A similar function is performed by the InVid Verification plugin for Chrome and Firefox browsers. It processes videos from social networks, as well as downloaded from a computer.

telegram bot - You can download videos from Instagram, Tik-Tok or Pinterest through the SaveAsBot , downloading is available only from open accounts, and it will not work with closed ones, even if they are your friends. Instagram stories can be downloaded and viewed through the IGSpyBot bot , while you remain anonymous. You can download videos from YouTube using the Save_youbot bot , clips from Vkontakte - using Vkclipsbot , from Facebook and Twitter - using Mediadownbot .

- The Metadata2go service allows you to view the metadata of a video file. They may contain the date of shooting, geolocation, the model of the device on which the shooting was made, and sometimes the name of the shooter.

— The Fotoforensics website analyzes the image by pixels. It is suitable for both video and photography. When uploading a video, it will analyze the frame on which it was stopped - for example, to analyze a video frame from YouTube, use a hyperlink with a timecode (to do this, stop the video at the right moment, click "Share", check the box next to the word "Start" and after copy this hyperlink). If changes were made to the video or photo, then they will be noticeable black or white spots on pixelated frames.

OSINT specialists often say that when analyzing information, it is important to "turn on the digital Sherlock Holmes mode." It means mindfulness. Watching the video, pay attention to the details. Often this allows you to consider the address, recognizable signs of the interior or landscape, and much more.

Then you can use the tools that we have already talked about - search by photo, in telegrams and many others. The more comprehensive your approach, the more likely you are to find what you are looking for.

Examples of using

- After the start of the Russian military operation in Ukraine, Telegram channels distributed videos allegedly confirming the use of GRAD volley fire. With the help of InVid, we find the original and find out that it was filmed in 2021. There are many similar videos from both sides since the beginning of the war. on TikTok For example, a video of “aircraft flying to bomb Kiev” was circulated – in fact, it was a video of the rehearsal of the 2020 parade, filmed in Tushino.

- Even before the start of the military operation, on Saturday, February 12, there were reports on social networks about an explosion in Donetsk. Margarita Simonyan spread the news, accompanying it with the comment : “Has it started?” And in some Russian reports they even showed the consequences of the explosion - shots of houses with broken windows. Through Youtube Data Viewer we find these shots: they were filmed back in January in the village of Aleksandrovka, 800 meters from the line of contact from the DPR. on social networks appeared Then a video , which allegedly recorded a sabotage of the Ukrainian military in the Horlivka region on December 18. But Metadata2go shows that the video file in its current form was saved on December 8, and before that it was in a folder called "Projects" since 2021.

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What do I get from this?

It is better to make decisions and form a point of view based on a real picture of the world, and not someone invented. Video filming is usually presented as an indisputable argument of one's own rightness, because a person cannot but believe his own eyes. However, the video is widely used to manipulate public opinion, so the skills to test it can be useful to everyone.