#FactCheck: War Thunder Game Footage Falsely Shared as Video of IAF MiG-29 Crash
Executive Summary
A video is being shared on social media with the claim that an Indian Air Force (IAF) MiG-29 fighter jet crashed while landing due to the pilot’s negligence. The claim further alleges that no casualties were reported in the incident and that the IAF is concealing the incident because it is losing fighter jets at a high rate. The video is being widely shared on social media.
CyberPeace Research found the claim to be false. Our Research revealed that the video is not footage of an actual IAF MiG-29 crash, but gameplay footage from the video game War Thunder, which is being shared with a false and misleading claim.
Claim:
An Indian Air Force MiG-29 fighter jet crashed while landing, with pilot error being blamed for the incident. The post further claims that the IAF is trying to conceal the incident.
https://x.com/sheikh__khirad/status/2100447634599342114?s=20
Fact Check
To verify the claim, we conducted a Google search using relevant keywords. However, we did not find any credible media report supporting the claim. We also checked the official X account of the Indian Army, but found no post confirming the claim.
https://x.com/adgpi
As part of our further research, we conducted a reverse image search of keyframes from the video. During the search, we found a YouTube channel where similar visuals had been uploaded.
We found that the channel regularly posts gaming-related content. At the end of our research, we found the original version of the viral video on the YouTube channel. It was published on July 13, 2026. The video description also clearly states that the footage is gaming content and not a real-life incident.
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/dVu0eMztePo
Conclusion
Our research found that the video being shared with the claim that an IAF MiG-29 fighter jet crashed during landing does not depict a real incident. The video is actually gameplay footage from the video game War Thunder.Therefore, gaming footage is being falsely presented on social media as footage of an Indian Air Force MiG-29 crashing during landing. The incident shown in the video is not real.
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Introduction
As per the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) ‘Cyber Crime In India Report 2022’, A total of 65,893 cases were registered under Cyber Crimes, showing an increase of 24.4% in registration in comparison to 52,974 cases registered in 2021. The crime rate increased from 3.9 in 2021 to 4.8 in 2022. During 2022, 64.8% of cyber-crime cases registered were for the motive of fraud (42,710 out of 65,893 cases), followed by Extortion with 5.5% (3,648 cases) and Sexual Exploitation with 5.2% (3,434 cases). The statistics released by NCRB show the increased rate of cyber crimes in the country, which poses a significant question of safety in the online world. The rise in cybercrime indicates a rise in emerging criminal groups with malicious intentions, creating new cybercrime hotspots in the country where these groups target and commit cyber crimes despite limited resources.
Cyber Crime Hotspots
Police have recently arrested several cyber criminals in a specific region, indicating that certain areas have become hotspots for cybercrime. Mewat region is one such hotspot indicating a growing trend of cybercrime operating from this area. The Mewat gang's modus operandi is quite different; Cybercriminals in Mewat scam mobile owners just using smartphones and SIM cards without kingpins and targeting mobile owners. The scammers also lure people through online marketplaces such as OLX, in which they pretend to sell possessions and then either physically lure victims to pick-up locations or scam them virtually.
A study conducted by Future Crime Research Foundation and IIT Kanpur in 2023 has revealed that Jamatara city, once considered the cyber crime capital of India, is no longer the epicentre. The study found that 35 hotspots in India are actively involved in cybercrime activities. The top 10 cybercrime hotspots in India collectively account for 80% of cybercrime-related cases in India. These districts are strategically located near India's capital or closer to the National Capital Region (NCR). These districts are strategically placed with multiple borders, making them easy targets for criminals.
Online financial fraud and social media-related crimes are the most common in India. Cybercriminals exploit data as a gold mine, using it to commit crimes. For instance, they can obtain banking and insurance data, use simple AI tools to cheat victims, and they can easily impersonate identities to lure innocent people. In cybercrime hotspots, sextortion is a modern way for cybercriminals to record and demand money. Loan app fraud, OLX fraud, and job fraud also originate from these specific regions.
Recommendations
To counter the challenges posed by emerging cybercrime hubs, the following recommendations are to be considered:
- Advanced threat Intelligence: The digital landscape is evolving, and the threat landscape is becoming more complex. AI's role in cybersecurity is becoming increasingly critical, both positively and negatively, as it helps in understanding and addressing advanced threats. AI is capable of proactive threat hunting, real-time anomaly detection, and swift incident response.
- Enhancing capabilities of Law Enforcement Agencies: Law enforcement agencies must be sensitised to advanced tools or techniques to investigate cyber crime cases effectively. The development and implementation of advanced forensic tools and technologies need to be utilised or implemented to keep up with the evolving tactics of cybercrime perpetrators.
- Continuous Monitoring: Continuous cybersecurity monitoring is crucial for detecting anomalies and preventing cyber-attacks. It involves analysing systems and data to establish baseline security, identify deviations, and investigate potential threats. Cybersecurity experts use data observability tools, artificial intelligence, and machine learning to detect unexpected dataset changes.
- Cyber Security Awareness: Public awareness needs to be higher. Cybercrime prevention and cybersecurity is a shared responsibility of all of us by being aware of the threats and following the best practices. The frequent interaction between law enforcement and the public is necessary to raise awareness about safeguarding personal and financial information. Effective campaigns on cyber security are necessary to educate netizens.
Safety Tips for Netizens
Install up-to-date security software and firewalls on devices, use strong passwords for accounts, and regularly update software and applications. Be cautious when clicking on links or downloading files from unknown sources, and be cautious of your personal information.
Conclusion
The rise of Cyber Crime Hotspots in specific regions or districts has significantly exacerbated the issue of increasing cybercrime rates. In order to combat cybercrime more effectively, it is necessary for law enforcement agencies to strengthen their coordination between different states and to adapt advanced technology methods to counter cybercrime threats effectively. Moreover, educating netizens about cyber crime threats and providing best practices is an effective method to counter these threats, considered the first line of defense against cybercrime.
References
- https://ncrb.gov.in/uploads/nationalcrimerecordsbureau/custom/1701607577CrimeinIndia2022Book1.pdf
- https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/tech/technology/no-kingpins-just-a-smartphone-and-sim-card-how-cybercriminals-in-mewat-scam-mobile-owners/articleshow/98062889.cms?from=mdr
- https://www.futurecrime.org/fcrf-cyber-crime-survey-2023
- https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/jamtara-loses-crown-as-new-remote-districts-rewrite-indias-cybercrime-map/articleshow/104475868.cms?from=mdr
- https://government.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/secure-india/80-of-cyber-crimes-from-10-new-districts-iit-report/103921338
- https://www.dw.com/en/how-mewat-became-indias-new-hub-for-cyber-criminals/video-68674527
- https://www.indiatoday.in/from-india-today-magazine/story/into-cybercrime-hotspot-india-mewat-rajasthan-haryana-uttar-pradesh-2381545-2023-05-19
- https://frontline.thehindu.com/the-nation/spotlight-how-nuh-district-in-haryana-became-a-breeding-ground-for-cybercriminals/article67098193.ece
- https://www.opindia.com/2024/04/nuh-mewat-cyber-crime-haryana-police-crackdown/#google_vignette
When your digital identity becomes raw material for someone else’s imagination, who really owns your face?
On July 7, 2026, Meta launched Muse Image, the first standalone image-generation model developed by Meta Superintelligence Labs under Alexandr Wang. Positioned as a competitor to OpenAI’s GPT Images 2.0 and Google’s Nano Banana 2, the launch highlights Meta’s growing ambitions in the generative AI race. Yet beneath the technical advancements lies a far more consequential question than what AI can create, but about who gets to decide what it creates with?
That ambition of generative AI comes with a cost, and one of Muse Image's most controversial design choices is its integration with Instagram, which allows public profiles to become creative references for AI-generated images. Users can tag public Instagram accounts in prompts and generate AI images inspired by that person’s publicly available content. Meta presents this as a new form of personalization and creativity. However, critics argue that the feature transforms years of personal photographs into a massive library of AI-ready human identities, where non-action automatically becomes permission. The concern is not just that AI can generate realistic images. The concern is that consent itself is being manipulated in a way.
The opt-out system most users never asked for
Muse Image operates through Meta AI’s integration with Instagram. A user can reference a public Instagram profile in a prompt, allowing the system to generate images influenced by that person’s existing content and likeness. Under the default arrangement, the person whose profile is being referenced may not necessarily approve the generation beforehand.
Meta does provide users with controls to restrict this functionality. The setting exists under Instagram’s “Sharing and reuse” options, where users can disable permissions related to the use of their posts and reels with Meta’s AI features. But the larger issue is the direction in which responsibility flows. Instead of requiring active permission before someone’s likeness becomes available for AI-generated content, the burden is placed on individuals to discover the feature, understand the implications, locate the setting, and disable it. In a digital environment where users already navigate endless privacy menus, cookie banners, and terms of service agreements, expecting meaningful awareness from billions of people becomes unrealistic. Consent that depends on finding the exit door is very different from consent that begins with a choice.
A guide for opting-out
One way of opting out is to have a private account. As verified, Meta does not encroach on private accounts as of now for image-generation.
But if you have a public account, here are the steps that can be followed to secure yourself from Meta’s Muse automatic consent:
On your profile, tap the menu bar which is on the top right (≡), you will enter into ‘setting and activity’, after that you will see an option of ‘sharing and refuse’ and then disable the options under it, namely- Allow people to reuse your content on Instagram and with AI features at Meta. Notably, the changes made will be only for your future content not the already existing content on your public profile.
Why “public” does not mean “available for anything”
The debate around Muse Image highlights a deeper misunderstanding at the center of modern digital platforms: the difference between visibility and reuse. When someone makes an Instagram account public, they are generally making a decision about the audience. They are allowing others to view their photos, discover their profile, or engage with their content. That decision was never traditionally understood as permission for their face, appearance, personal moments, or identity markers to become reusable components in AI-generated media. A photograph posted online has context. It represents a specific moment, purpose, relationship, or expression. Generative AI changes that equation because it separates identity from context. A person’s likeness can be extracted from its original context and placed into entirely new situations created by someone else. Muse Image does not just expand who can see your content. It expands what can be done with it. That distinction is what scales the problem for every public user on the app. The privacy implications become significantly larger because of Instagram’s global reach. With billions of users worldwide, even a small percentage of affected public accounts represents an enormous number of people. Many public profiles do not belong to celebrities, influencers, or creators who intentionally operate as public brands. They belong to students, professionals, small businesses, artists, photographers, and everyday users who simply chose visibility within a social network.
For years, platforms encouraged people to share more, build audiences, and maintain a public digital presence. Now, the meaning of that public presence is changing after the fact. The question becomes: should a decision made years ago to share photos socially automatically extend into permission for generative AI systems built years later?
There is also a catch while opting out. Changing these settings only protects your content from being used in future AI generations, it does not undo anything that has already happened. Any AI images previously created using your public profile will remain unaffected. Essentially, the opt-out works as a shield for what comes next, not a reset button for what has already been created.
A familiar pattern in the AI era
Muse Image reflects a broader pattern emerging across the technology industry. New AI capabilities are introduced at massive scale, participation becomes the default, and individual control arrives afterward through settings that many users may never find. The same debates that once surrounded targeted advertising, data collection, and algorithmic profiling are now moving into a far more personal territory, the human identity itself. Faces are not ordinary data points. Unlike a username, password, or preference setting, a person cannot simply replace their appearance once it has been widely replicated.
Technical solutions such as AI watermarking and content labels may help identify generated material, but they address authenticity after creation. They do not answer the question of whether the generation should have happened in the first place.
Innovation cannot replace consent
The technological progress behind Muse Image is significant. Better image generation, improved text rendering, and more personalized creative tools represent genuine advances in artificial intelligence. But capability alone cannot determine acceptability. The future of AI will not only depend on how realistic images become, how powerful models become, or how quickly companies can deploy new features. It will also depend on whether people feel they have meaningful control over their own digital identities. Muse Image is therefore more than another AI product launch. It represents a defining question for the next phase of the internet: Will our online presence remain something we control, or will it become something others can generate?
Executive Summary
Amid the ongoing tensions in West Asia between the United States–Israel alliance and Iran since February 28, 2026, a video is rapidly going viral on social media. The clip shows buildings engulfed in flames and thick plumes of smoke following an attack. Several users are sharing it with the claim that it depicts Iran’s recent strike on Tel Aviv, Israel. However, an research by the CyberPeace found the claim to be misleading. The viral video is actually from August 2025, when Israel carried out airstrikes in Sanaa, the capital of Yemen. It has no connection to the current conflict.
Claim:
An Instagram user ‘iran_.news24’ posted the video on March 27, 2026, with the caption: “Iran has turned Israel’s largest city Tel Aviv into hell—fears that 200,000 people have died in the war so far.”
Fact Check
To verify the viral claim, keyframes of the video were extracted and searched using Google Lens. The same video was found posted on August 24, 2025, by a Facebook user ‘Mhmdmhywbalshrby5’. The accompanying text, when translated, stated that it showed Israeli bombardment of Sanaa, Yemen.
Similarly, another Instagram user ‘ae5ce’ had also shared the same video on August 24, 2025, identifying it as footage from Sanaa.
Media reports further support this finding. According to a report published by Egypt Today on August 24, 2025, Israel carried out multiple airstrikes in Sanaa targeting key locations, including an oil station, a power facility, and the presidential palace. Casualties were also reported. The strikes were said to be in response to attacks by Houthi forces.
Additionally, the New York Post shared another video of the same incident from a different angle on its X (formerly Twitter) handle on August 25, 2025.
Conclusion
The video being circulated with the claim of Iran attacking Tel Aviv is actually old footage from Israeli airstrikes in Yemen in August 2025. It is unrelated to the ongoing conflict.
