More than 18 million fans follow Madonna on her Instagram account. A real house number that promises a lot of coverage. Madonna uses this range not only for promotion on her own behalf, but also for socially relevant topics.
On Tuesday she commemorated the victims of the earthquakes in Turkey and Syria and called for donations in her contribution. More than 33,000 people had already been identified as dead at the time, and many more without a home or job. An emotional situation for Madonna: “It’s heartbreaking,” she wrote in her post on Instagram.
Also included in the post are several photos that appear to come from the crisis region. However, several of the images do not actually show footage from Turkey or Syria. The very first “photo” of a Greek helper holding a Turkish child is actually a total forgery.
Bizarre: Unknown people have apparently used state-of-the-art image generators that work with artificial intelligence. An indication of this: Pictures from “Dall-E” or “Midjourney” look deceptively real in many areas, but they often have problems with their hands.
This is also the case in this case: the fireman has six fingers on his right hand. It is also noticeable that the posture and image composition in the alleged photo are similar to other “Midjourney” shots.
Another apparent photo of a little boy in the earthquake area from Madonna’s post is also not an authentic shot. In this case it is a real photo, but it comes from the photo agency Shutterstock. There, customers can buy photos for articles or social media appearances – but the people in the photos are usually models.
That certainly doesn’t detract from Madonna’s good thoughts. But it shows once again that you should be careful with photos and news from apparent crisis areas and rely on reliable sources – especially with a reach in the millions.
