A new wave of artificial intelligence-generated videos depicting fabricated protest scenes in Iran has emerged across social media platforms, according to research published Wednesday. These hyper-realistic deepfakes have collectively garnered approximately 3.5 million views while exploiting information gaps created by the Iranian government’s internet restrictions.
Disinformation monitoring organization NewsGuard identified seven distinct AI-generated videos circulating online, created by both pro-government and anti-regime actors. Among the most prominent examples was a clip distributed on X (formerly Twitter) showing women protesters destroying a vehicle belonging to the Basij paramilitary force, which has been deployed to suppress demonstrations. This particular video accumulated nearly 720,000 views.
Additional fabricated content included videos showing Iranian protesters symbolically renaming streets after former U.S. President Donald Trump, with one clip depicting demonstrators changing a street sign to “Trump St” amid cheers from the crowd. These developments occurred as Trump repeatedly discussed providing assistance to Iranian protesters, though he noted Wednesday that he had received information suggesting the government had halted its violent crackdown.
Simultaneously, pro-regime social media users circulated AI-generated content purporting to show massive government-supported counterprotests throughout Iran. Experts indicate these fabricated videos represent a dangerous new frontier in information warfare, where AI-generated “hallucinated” visual content increasingly overshadows authentic imagery during major news events.
The phenomenon highlights how partisan actors exploit AI tools to advance competing narratives during information vacuums. NewsGuard analyst Ines Chomnalez observed: “There’s a lot of news—but no way to get it because of the internet blackout. Foreign social media users are turning to AI video generators to advance their own narratives about the unfolding chaos.”
This incident follows a pattern of AI fabrications distorting breaking news events, including false narratives surrounding the U.S. capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro and a deadly shooting by immigration agents in Minneapolis. AFP fact-checkers additionally uncovered misrepresented imagery creating misleading narratives about the Iranian protests, including videos actually filmed in Greece and Nepal being presented as current events in Iran.