Ukraine War social media reporting
The Russo-Ukraine war has sparked a flood of misinformation online. There are TikTok users claiming to be inside of Ukraine, posting fake images and videos and encouraging people to donate to their accounts. There are clips from movies and documentaries such as Winter on Fire: Ukraine's Fight for Freedom (2015) on Netflix that are circulating online, claiming to show the war on the ground. Out-of-context photos are being posted all over social media channels, stoking fear, anxiety, and confusion. With all this misinformation and disinformation circulating online – how are journalists and citizens supposed to debunk and verify information independently in such a widespread and fast-moving crisis?
The reality is, they can’t. At least, not without help, tools, and strategies.
The Russian government has long used disinformation as a way to push its political agenda. Putin, a former KGB agent, uses methods of misdirection and deception to create instability and gain strength, according to Western intelligence experts. In fact, U.S. intelligence communities were so certain Russia was going to invade Ukraine that they declassified Putin’s invasion plans in order to try to overcome Russian disinformation weeks prior to the war. But that didn’t deter Putin from invading Ukraine. Russia has built a powerful propaganda machine that weaponizes social media platforms, blogs, websites, and messaging apps. A portion of that propaganda machine was put to the test during the 2016 U.S. presidential election. One of Russia’s coordinated disinformation organizations was called the Internet Research Agency (IRA). And one of its key strategies was to tap into the emotional sentiment of people using social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram in order to help push propaganda. Social media research reveals that users are more likely to spread false or misleading news that upsets or angers them. The Russian government is an expert at manipulating social media platforms’ algorithms in order to get misinformation to go viral online. Although the IRA ceases to exist under its original name now, there are many experts who believe Russian-backed groups are still coordinating propaganda messages online, launching cyberattacks, and conducting other nefarious digital acts in order to push Russia’s agenda in Ukraine.
It’s important to remember that debunking photos and videos is a losing game. There’s too much misinformation online. A more productive mindset is to focus on what you can verify. What do you know to be true based on sources and eyewitness statements? What can you report to the public? What information progresses the story? What is relevant and important information to help citizens make informed decisions? Those questions should guide your social media reporting. And if you are trying to debunk critical footage, then focus on conserving your energy by finding efficient methods of doing so, that way you have time and resources to dedicate to reporting verified information.
The best advice I have for journalists and citizens who are trying to navigate this information space, and this is coming from an expert in social media newsgathering and verification, is to try to rely on verified reporters who are on the ground for primary information. CNN, the New York Times, Washington Post, BBC, and other vetted and reputable news organizations have reporters in Ukraine. However, journalists can’t be everywhere, and that’s why citizen journalists who record user-generated content, also known as UGC, are also incredibly vital in capturing the full scope of what’s happening in Ukraine.
Here’s an example of a newsworthy moment that was captured by an ordinary citizen and uploaded to social media. The video shows a Russian tank driving down a Ukrainian highway. We know this is a Russian tank because it matches earlier reports of Russian tanks that were crossing into Ukrainian territory. While driving down the road, the Russian tank crosses multiple lanes and runs over a pedestrian-controlled vehicle. The video is horrific. And the incident seemed unprovoked.
WARNING SOME READERS MAY FIND THIS CONTENT GRAPHIC AND DISTURBING:
Verify videos by using multiple sources sharing similar footage
So how would we go about verifying this incident? One of the easiest ways to verify whether a video is real or not is by checking whether other social media users are posting videos or photos of the situation from different angles, which is what happened in this case. Since the incident occurred in an urban area, there were several citizens who documented the Russian tank crashing into a pedestrian-controlled car. When it comes to verifying this footage, we can have more confidence that this video not only happened in Ukraine, but also that it took place fairly recently, and was observed by multiple eyewitnesses.
Additionally, there was more footage that appeared on social media channels, like Reddit and Twitter which showed local Ukrainians using their physical strength to try to pull the elderly man out of the wreckage after the incident. Thankfully, the elderly man was alive, according to local reports.
If you’re trying to find similar videos to corroborate a video you’re investigating, then here are some of my tips for how to find that content:
Reverse video search using Google
There’s no easy way to reverse video search online, currently. There’s a lot of time, energy, and processing power that has to be used in order to do that. Therefore, this hack, using Google Images may help you.
First, play the video and capture a screenshot of the video. What you capture in this screenshot is very important. It should be something identifiable like a monument, a visible street sign, a landmark. Try to avoid capturing images of people. Unless they are famous or wearing a uniform, they likely won’t yield many results on Google Images.
Next, upload your screenshot to Google Images using the camera icon.
When you get your results, scan through them to see if you can find anything similar. Or click on the option “More” and navigate to “Videos” to find possible related video content.
To be clear, this process doesn’t always yield results. The thing about social media investigating is that it is a process of trial and error. For example, the video below was posted around Friday, February 26, and it shows a Ukrainian man running onto a road to stop a Russian convoy from entering Ukraine. It’s a tense video and reminded a lot of people online of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protest and massacre. The video was posted on Twitter by the news outlet HB.
I took a screenshot of the video, which came out a bit grainy, and I uploaded it to Google Images.
Google was able to identify that the image likely was from Ukraine and the Russian invasion, but it wasn’t able to locate the exact video or original source.
How to use Reddit to find similar videos
If the video is going viral and you want to find more like it, you might want to try Reddit. The platform has a very active community of digital sleuths. For example, you could try navigating to r/videos or r/news and looking for posts that match the video you’re investigating. Likely, if the video is going viral somewhere else online, it will be posted on Reddit or sometimes it may have originated from Reddit. What’s interesting about the Reddit community is that some users will post similar videos or add context to news-related content as a way to inform the community. Reading through the comments of posts that match your video may help you discover other videos that are similar too.
For example, the video showing the pedestrian-controlled vehicle being run over by a Russian tank was posted onto Reddit. And then other users replied in the comments of the video to provide other angles and footage showing the same incident. Therefore, corroborating the video.
However, this process might also not also yield results. For example, the video of the Ukrainian man stepping in front of a Russian convoy was uploaded to this subreddit. But if you look through the comments, you don’t find similar images or videos. And that’s likely because it was captured in a rural area, and it’s possible that just one of these videos exists because there weren’t that many people around to document the incident.
Google Earth for verifying Ukraine War photos and videos
But what happens when you don’t have multiple videos of a situation? What do you do? You can try to match the landscape of the video to see if there are similarities with Google Earth, but this is only partially helpful. Because satellite imagery on Google Earth isn’t immediately updated. In fact, some street view images can be a few years old. Since Russian separatists have been in parts of Ukraine since 2014, we can run into problems where location information matches, but those photos or videos may have been captured at another time.
For instance, there was a video circulating online that showed Russian paratroopers floating in the sky as they headed to their destination. The video was circulating throughout TikTok with people claiming Russians were dropping down on Ukraine, however, this video was actually from a training session from earlier in the year. Journalists were able to figure it out because it was still live on Instagram, and the account that posted it (@romanadler123) appeared to have uploaded the video in 2021.
Google Earth does not have historical street view imagery but the feature does exist on Google Maps.
A way to check out old images on Google Maps is to navigate to Google Street View.
From there, depending on the address you’re looking up, a clock icon may display under the address at the top-left of the map, which means historical street view imagery is available for this location.
From there, click the clock to expand the dates to show the imagery that is available.
For example, you can test this process out by looking up this address: 1600 Amphitheatre Pkwy, Mountain View, CA 94043 – this is Google’s main campus. Once you look up the image on Google Maps, you can navigate to street-view and look for the clock that gives you a timeline of historic street-view information.
Google Earth does let you look up some historical satellite imagery. To do this, you will need to download the desktop version of Google Earth. Whenever you use the app, it will default to showing you the current satellite imagery. But to see past satellite images of the same location, you can do the following:
When looking up a location in the search bar, hit enter, and then click on “View.”
Then click on “historical imagery,” which will allow you to select a certain time.
Although these tips may seem simple, they can be extremely powerful. This war already has a lot of disinformation, with the right tools and strategies, you can work on staying informed and safe. And remember, the situation in Ukraine is fast-moving and changing rapidly. If you aren’t sure about the validity of the information you’re watching, then turn to reliable news sources that have journalists on the ground in Ukraine. Stay curious.
