In August 2025, a photograph of a girl with a poster against the “agreement” between the presidents of Russia and the United States on the issue of the war in Ukraine spread across Telegram channels. We have verified the authenticity of this image.
A photograph of the activist circulated on August 11, ahead of bilateral talks between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump in Alaska. The girl allegedly took part in a protest against the meeting of the Russian and American leaders, going to the demonstration with a poster in Ukrainian: “I am against Trump’s agreement with Putin on the division of Ukraine.” The photo was distributed by Telegram channels “Voblya • news"(119,000 at the time of writing this analysis), "Sheikh Tamir"(112,000), "We're obsessed with the news. MPL."(98,000), "Cartel"(91,000), "Gasparyan"(57,000), etc.
After negotiations Putin with Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff, held in the Kremlin on August 6, American President announced about plans to hold a meeting with the Russian leader. She took place August 15 in Alaska, in the city of Anchorage. The summit was opposed by some local residents throughout the state passed actions, the participants of which called for preventing decisions about the fate of Ukraine from being made without its representatives. These rallies were actively covered by local and international media, while there is no information on the Internet about similar actions in Ukraine itself.
A reverse image search led to the original version of the viral image. She was published on the Telegram channel of Radio Liberty on July 22 at 20:16 Moscow time. However, the inscription on the poster differs from the original photograph. It says: “Ukraine is being killed by Russians and corruption” - and the number 12414 is crossed out on the side. Judging by the caption to the post, the photo was taken in Kyiv near the theater. Ivan Franko. Part of the facade of this building visible in the background.
The activist took part in protests that took place in July in many cities of Ukraine. Demonstrations started July 21, after deputies of the Verkhovna Rada amended bill No. 12414, depriving the country’s two main anti-corruption bodies of independence: the National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAP). The protests lasted three days and stopped after Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky contributed a new bill has been submitted to parliament to return independence to NABU and SAP.
Upon closer inspection of the viral photo, other differences from the original are noticeable: in the July photo, the protester’s T-shirt shows the coat of arms of Ukraine and a silver pendant, while in the version that went viral in August, they have merged into a single whole. The girl's face is also slightly different, and some details in the background are blurred. This suggests that neural networks could be used to falsify the image. Analysis of the image through the generated content recognition service Hive showed a high probability that AI was used in its processing.
The altered photo of the girl spread among both Russian-speaking and Ukrainian-speaking users. At the same time, the earliest publication that was found was “Verified”, was posted in the Ukrainian Telegram channel “Teacher Yoda” on August 10 at 12:48 Moscow time. The blogger captioned the photo as follows: “Meanwhile, somewhere in a parallel reality, there is a protest of honest and patriotic Ukrainian liberal democratic youth with cardboard boxes under the US Embassy.” In the comments, users noticed that the photo looks like it was generated by AI. The author confirmed this guess, but explained that he only replaced the text on the original photo. At the same time, he admitted that the post itself - both the photograph and the caption to it - is ironic.
Despite the author’s comment, the photo was later circulated as if it were genuine, and the girl’s story began to acquire more details. For example, some bloggers claimed that Ukrainians with such posters come out at a protest after the date of negotiations between the presidents of the Russian Federation and the United States was announced.
This is not the first time that photographs from the rallies that took place in Ukraine in July have become the subject of manipulation. Thus, the Center for Countering Disinformation at the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine reported about the dissemination of an edited photo in which a protester allegedly holds a sign with the inscription “Better ZOV than ZVO” (the latter abbreviation refers to the initials of the country’s president in Ukrainian spelling). "Verified" also sorted it out a fake story that a Kyiv activist was allegedly summoned to court for a poster “I am a dog, and Zelensky is a dog.”
Thus, a photo of an activist with a poster “I am against Trump’s agreement with Putin on the division of Ukraine” was edited using AI, and the image was based on a photo from the July protests against the decision to deprive Ukrainian anti-corruption agencies of independence. The author of the edited picture confirmed that he created it for entertainment purposes.
Cover photo: social networks
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