#FactCheck: Fake Claim that US has used Indian Airspace to attack Iran
Executive Summary:
An online claim alleging that U.S. bombers used Indian airspace to strike Iran has been widely circulated, particularly on Pakistani social media. However, official briefings from the U.S. Department of Defense and visuals shared by the Pentagon confirm that the bombers flew over Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq. Indian authorities have also refuted the claim, and the Press Information Bureau (PIB) has issued a fact-check dismissing it as false. The available evidence clearly indicates that Indian airspace was not involved in the operation.
Claim:
Various Pakistani social media users [archived here and here] have alleged that U.S. bombers used Indian airspace to carry out airstrikes on Iran. One widely circulated post claimed, “CONFIRMED: Indian airspace was used by U.S. forces to strike Iran. New Delhi’s quiet complicity now places it on the wrong side of history. Iran will not forget.”
Fact Check:
Contrary to viral social media claims, official details from U.S. authorities confirm that American B2 bombers used a Middle Eastern flight path specifically flying over Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq to reach Iran during Operation Midnight Hammer.
The Pentagon released visuals and unclassified briefings showing this route, with Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. Dan Caine explained that the bombers coordinated with support aircraft over the Middle East in a highly synchronized operation.
Additionally, Indian authorities have denied any involvement, and India’s Press Information Bureau (PIB) issued a fact-check debunking the false narrative that Indian airspace was used.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, official U.S. briefings and visuals confirm that B-2 bombers flew over the Middle East not India to strike Iran. Both the Pentagon and Indian authorities have denied any use of Indian airspace, and the Press Information Bureau has labeled the viral claims as false.
- Claim: Fake Claim that US has used Indian Airspace to attack Iran
- Claimed On: Social Media
- Fact Check: False and Misleading
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Every year, a few days before Diwali, our phone starts filling up. Rangoli photos, family reunions, new cars, sweet boxes, "we're off to Goa" stories. We enjoy all of it. We also know that somewhere, a scammer is enjoying it too, and taking notes. Festivals bring out our generosity, but also our hurry habit of sharing everything online. Fraudsters have learned to use all. So this is not a lecture about staying off the internet. It is a short guide to enjoying the festival online without handing someone the keys to your house, your bank account or your phone.
When the discount is the trap
A branded phone at half price. A timer counting down from ten minutes. “Only 8 pieces left.” None of it is new, and all of it works, because the goal is to stop the buyer from thinking. A person who pauses will compare prices, look up the seller and wonder why anyone would sell an iPhone at a loss. A person who thinks the offer vanishes in ten minutes will skip all of that.
Lucky draws and “Diwali gifts” are the same trick with a different costume. The message says a hamper has been won and a small delivery or processing fee is needed. There is no hamper. In Secunderabad, a woman reportedly lost Rs 1,40,000 to exactly this kind of festive gift offer. One small fee, then another, then a request for card details, and the money is gone.
A simple habit beats most of these: never trust the link. If a deal arrives in a message, open the brand’s own app or type the address by hand and look for the same offer. Real ones will be sitting there. Fake ones never are.
The file that looks like a greeting
Of all the festive tricks, the fake APK does the most damage. An APK is just the installer for an Android app. Apps from the Play Store get checked. A file that lands on WhatsApp or SMS gets checked by nobody, and tapping “install” hands it the run of the phone.
It arrives dressed as something harmless: a Diwali greeting app, a shopping app, a “pending challan”, a bank reward points update, a wedding invitation in file form. Once installed, it can read messages, which means the OTPs coming from the bank now reach someone else too. Some versions let the fraudster watch and control the screen.
There’s a case from Hyderabad that shows how ordinary it looks. A 69-year-old man in Azampura called a customer care number for a delivery app that turned out to be fake, was sent an installation file, and ended up losing more than Rs 1,02,000. No drama, no threats. Just a helpful voice and one tap.
A few rules cover nearly all of it. Apps come from the official store only, and even there the developer name and download count deserve a look. “Install unknown apps” should stay off in settings. Banks do not send APK files for KYC, ever. Customer care numbers belong to the official app or website, never to a search result or a comment under a post. And if a relative sends a file, a phone call to them first is cheap insurance, since their account may have been hijacked without their knowing.
If a suspicious app has already gone in, switch on airplane mode straight away, uninstall it, call the bank from a different phone and change passwords from a clean device. Speed matters more than being sure.
Fake websites that look almost right
Copying a website’s look is easy. Copying its address is impossible, so scammers settle for an address that’s close enough to pass at a glance. A swapped letter, an extra hyphen, “.shop” or “.xyz” at the end instead of “.com”. On a phone screen, in a hurry, with the kids shouting about crackers, nobody notices.
The padlock icon doesn’t settle the question either. It only says the connection is encrypted, and scam sites get padlocks as easily as real ones. What does help is a slow read of the address before typing anything in, and a bit of suspicion toward any page reached from an ad or a forwarded link. Searching for the brand and going from there takes ten seconds.
Other giveaways are boring but reliable. No cash on delivery. Only UPI or bank transfer accepted. No return policy, no working phone number, no real address. Prices lower than every other shop on earth. A page with all of those is rarely a bargain.
Holiday bookings deserve their own warning. Around Diwali, fake resort and homestay listings pop up everywhere: a smart advertisement, a “manager” chatting on WhatsApp, a convincing receipt, and then nothing after the advance is paid. Booking through the property’s official site or a known platform, and confirming on the number listed there, closes most of that door.
What the post gives away
Not every risk comes as a link. Some of it comes from the timeline itself.
“Off to Goa for a week, can’t wait!” is also a message to anyone who’d like to know when the house is empty. Holiday pictures can wait until everyone’s back. The same goes for boarding passes and train tickets, which carry a barcode and booking reference that can be used to alter or cancel a trip. They look like souvenirs. They’re closer to keys.
Photos have a habit of showing more than intended. The family standing at the front door can reveal the house number, the nameplate and the lane. A school uniform shows the school. A live location tag at the airport, then the hotel, then the restaurant, draws a neat map of where the family is and where it isn’t. Pictures of cash envelopes, jewellery and new gadgets bring likes, and also attention nobody asked for.
A useful test before hitting post: what could a stranger work out from this, and what could they do with it? If the honest answer makes the stomach drop a little, crop it, blur it or save it for later. Children’s pictures deserve extra thought, because routines are easy to piece together from a few festive posts.
Charging on the way home
Millions travel home for Diwali, and railway stations, airports and bus stands are packed. Phones are at 4%. A free USB charging point is right there, and it looks like a blessing.
It can also be a problem. A USB cable carries power and data together, so a tampered port or a planted cable can try to push malware onto a phone or pull information off it. This is called juice jacking. Modern phones usually ask whether the connected device should be trusted, but a tired traveller taps “Allow” without reading, and that tap is exactly what the attacker is hoping for.
The fix is cheap. Carry a charger and use a regular wall socket. Keep a power bank charged before leaving home. If a USB port is the only choice, use a charge-only cable or a small data blocker, and refuse any prompt asking to trust the device. A cable found lying around, or one handed over by a friendly stranger, goes nowhere near the phone. Banking and payment apps also don’t belong on public Wi-Fi, however urgent the transfer feels.
Small things worth doing this week
Two-factor authentication on email, social media and banking takes five minutes and blocks a surprising number of break-ins. A quick look at privacy settings before the festive photos go up is worth the same five minutes. And a short chat with parents and grandparents helps more than any app: show them what a fake message looks like, and tell them that no bank, courier or company will ever ask for an OTP.
If money does go missing, time is the one thing that counts. The national cybercrime helpline is 1930, and complaints can be filed at cybercrime.gov.in. Reporting within the first few hours gives the best chance of freezing the transaction before it travels further.
Light the diyas, lock the phone
None of this means a quieter Diwali. The sweets, the lights and the photographs are the point of the whole thing. It just takes the same instinct that bolts the front door at night, pointed at the phone in the hand.
Let the diyas be the only thing on display. The OTPs, the location and the travel dates can stay at home.
Wishing everyone a safe, bright and happy Diwali.
Executive Summary
A video of Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping is being shared on social media. In the video, the two leaders can be seen cooking together and interacting with each other.The video is being linked to the BRICS Summit held at Bharat Mandapam in Delhi on September 12 and 13, 2026, with the claim that Putin and Xi Jinping were seen in this manner during the summit. The viral claim was found to be false in CyberPeace Research Wing’s research. Our research revealed that the video being shared on social media is not recent. The video dates back to 2018, when Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping cooked together during the Eastern Economic Forum held in Vladivostok, Russia.
Claim:
A Facebook user shared the viral video with the caption: “Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping enjoyed cooking and sharing a meal together in India. The special camaraderie between the two leaders was on display during the BRICS Summit.” The link to the post, along with an archive link and screenshot, is provided below.
https://www.instagram.com/reels/DdOFovfkelC/
Factcheck
To verify the authenticity of the viral claim, we conducted a reverse image search of the keyframes from the video. During the search, we found visuals matching the video on the Armenpress website, published on September 12, 2018. The link to the post and the screenshot are provided below.
https://armenpress.am/en/article/946878
According to the report, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping took a break from the hectic schedule of international diplomacy on Tuesday to make pancakes on the sidelines of an economic forum. Chinese President Xi Jinping was among the prominent leaders attending the event in Russia’s Far Eastern city of Vladivostok. The forum primarily focused on economic ties and issues related to North Korea.During the event, the two leaders made blini, a traditional Russian pancake, together at an exhibition called “Far East Street”, which showcased the region’s cultural and economic achievements. Photographs showed Putin and Xi Jinping wearing blue aprons as they poured pancake batter onto a griddle and flipped the pancakes. They later enjoyed the pancakes with caviar and vodka. As we continued our research, we found the same video on The Straits Times’ Facebook page, where it was published on September 11, 2018. According to the information provided with the video, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping took a break from the hectic schedule of international diplomacy to make pancakes together on the sidelines of an economic forum. The link to the post and the screenshot are provided below.
https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1915270415222092
Meanwhile, for context, according to a report by a news agency, the BRICS Summit was underway in Delhi. Saturday was an important day of the summit, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosted a dinner for several heads of state, including Chinese President Xi Jinping. Several leaders, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, attended the special dinner. However, Chinese President Xi Jinping was not present. According to sources cited by the news agency, Xi Jinping did not attend the dinner.
https://ndtv.in/india/chinese-president-xi-jinping-skips-brics-gala-dinner-what-reason-12039666
Conclusion
Our research found that the video showing Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping making pancakes together is not recent and has no connection with the 2026 BRICS Summit held in Delhi. The claim circulating on social media is therefore false and misleading. Further research established that the video dates back to 2018, when Putin and Xi participated in the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, Russia. During the event, the two leaders were seen preparing traditional Russian pancakes, or blini, together at an exhibition showcasing the cultural and economic achievements of Russia’s Far East region. Therefore, the video is being shared with a false context by linking an old 2018 event to the recently held BRICS Summit.
Executive Summary
A video is going viral on social media in the name of the protests organised by the ‘Cockroach Janata Party’ (CJP) in Delhi on October 10 and 11. The video is being shared as footage from Delhi Railway Station, with the claim that the protests led to a massive traffic jam outside the station. CyberPeace Research conducted a detailed analysis of the viral video and found the claim to be misleading. The video is not from Delhi but from Sealdah Railway Station in Kolkata, where students held a protest in July 2026. The old video from that time is now being circulated in connection with the protests in Delhi, falsely linking the two events.
Claim
On October 10, 2026, the Facebook page ‘Atrangi Khabar’ shared a video with the following caption:“Massive Protest and Traffic Jam: Huge Crowd Gathers Outside Delhi Railway Station, Several Passengers Miss Their Trains! A massive traffic jam occurred outside Delhi Railway Station on Saturday due to a large-scale protest.
As a result, railway passengers faced severe difficulties reaching the station, and several passengers even missed their trains because of the traffic congestion. The video clearly shows a huge crowd filling the roads and an atmosphere of chaos all around.”
https://www.facebook.com/reel/2176543963241315/?s=single_unit
Fact Check
To verify the authenticity of the viral video, we first extracted several keyframes and searched them using Google Lens. We found that the video had been uploaded on multiple platforms on earlier dates. An Instagram account named ‘Faruk Biswas’ (faruk.biswas.581730) had shared the video on July 24, 2026, identifying it as footage of a student protest in Kolkata.
https://www.instagram.com/reels/DbLd3N3of7a/
During our search, we also found the same video on a Facebook page named ‘KaimurLive’. The caption accompanying the video read, “Student protests continue in Kolkata and several other parts of the country. Today, a massive gathering of students was seen on the streets of Kolkata. #NEETPaperLeak”
http://facebook.com/reel/2024661971511084
Conclusion
Our research found the viral post to be misleading. An old video from Sealdah Railway Station in Kolkata is being falsely shared as footage from Delhi Railway Station. The original video dates back to July 2026 and has no connection to the protests held in Delhi on October 10 and 11, 2026.
