At the end of May 2024, a photo of an advertisement allegedly displayed in one of the Ukrainian stores went around the Internet. We have verified the authenticity of this photo.
It is alleged that in the Vinnytsia region, the territorial center for recruitment and social support (TCK and SP, the Ukrainian equivalent of the military registration and enlistment office) prohibited retail outlets located in the region from selling wigs to men. As confirmation, a photograph of the corresponding advertisement from one such store is provided. It is understood that the reason for introducing the ban is to combat evaders who buy wigs in order to avoid being seen by TCC employees in public places.
With appropriate captions, the photos were distributed as pro-Russian (“Arguments and facts", "Vinnitsa news feed"), and pro-Ukrainian (0542.ua, Varta1) resources. The picture gained particular popularity on Telegram, where it was published by the channels “Trash ⚡️ Ukraine"(845,000 views at the time of writing this analysis), "Ukraine now» (336,000), Colonelcassad (239,000), "Newsach / Dvach"(183,000), Shtoll News (150,000), "Sheikh Tamir"(140,000) and Voblya (136,000).
The Ukrainian-language text of the advertisement reads: “It is forbidden by the orders of the Vinnytsia Regional TCC and JV, peruki and hairpieces are sold to only a few women” (“According to the order of the Chairman of the Vinnytsia Regional TCC and JV, we sell wigs and hairpieces only to women”).
Indeed, issues of mobilization in the Vinnytsia region, as in other regions of Ukraine, is engaged local territorial center for recruitment and social support. However, the head of this structure is called the word “kerivnik"("manager") or "boss", but not "head".
The very assumption that a local TCC can regulate trade looks implausible. Nothing is said about such powers in Regulations about the functioning of these authorities. Such issues are the responsibility of the regional administration - for example, it was its chairman Sergei Borzov in 2023 signed order on restrictions on the sale of alcohol in the Vinnytsia region.
“Verified” found no traces of an order establishing restrictions on the sale of wigs on the official page Vinnytsia Regional TCC and JV on Facebook. Not a single sufficiently authoritative Ukrainian media reported either about the ban itself or about the placement of such signs in local stores. In addition, the frame with the ad in all publications on the Internet is the same - it turns out that if it was posted, it was only in one store, and no one photographed it from a different angle.
If you upload a viral photo to a reverse image search service Google, then only numerous publications about the proposed ban will appear in the search results. If you cut the ad, mirror the resulting fragment and upload it to a similar service from “Yandex", then in the list of similar images you can see a mention of a Kyiv online store of hair and wigs Topwigs.
The interior of the Topwigs salon in the capital's Metrograd shopping center is similar to the store depicted in the viral photo.
And on the store page on “Google Maps"You can find the desired frame.
As indicated under the original photo, it was taken in August 2019. The advertisement on it is dedicated to the cost of trying on wigs.
The color of the chair is also noteworthy: during processing, blue was replaced with brown. Probably, the authors of the fake did this to make the original frame more difficult to find through reverse search.
Thus, a photograph taken in Kyiv in 2019 was cropped, mirrored, processed in a graphics editor and passed off as a photograph allegedly taken in the Vinnytsia region five years later. According to the TGStat service, the first to post the edited photo was on April 27 at 12:45 Moscow time by the Telegram channel “Shaman Rahu" This channel repeatedly featured V debriefings “Verified” as a source of dissemination of false information about the war in Ukraine.
Cover photo: social networks
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