False posts share AI-generated footage of fire caused by gas leak in Malaysia
"Malaysia: A major fire broke out in a fuel pipeline and spread to surrounding areas. Damage and casualties are yet to be determined," reads the Vietnamese-language caption of a Facebook clip shared on April 1, 2025.
The video, which was viewed more than 190,000 times, purportedly shows the fire and plumes of smoke wafting over nearby buildings.
"I am now at Putra Heights," says someone in Malay, referring to a residential area near Malaysia's capital Kuala Lumpur where a massive fire caused by a gas pipeline leak started on April 1 (archived link).
More than 100 people were injured by the fire, which started as residents were enjoying a public holiday for Eid celebrations in the Muslim-majority country.
Screenshots from the video were shared elsewhere in similar posts on Facebook here and here and on TikTok.
But the video circulating online differs from footage of the April 1 inferno and the surrounding area available on AFP's YouTube channel (archived link).
Google Street View imagery of Putra Heights also looks different to how it is depicted in the circulating video -- the buildings in the area are less densely packed, with more greenery surrounding them (archived link).
Shu Hu, head of Purdue University's Machine Learning and Media Forensics Lab, told AFP in an April 8 email there are at least two clues that indicate the footage used in the circulating video was generated by AI (archived link).
He first pointed to cars seemingly passing through one another in the right lane of the road leading from the fire.
He also said vehicles in the road's left lane "move at an unnaturally rapid speed".
"Initially, numerous cars are visible; however, they quickly and inexplicably vanish from the scene."
While there is no foolproof method to spot AI-generated media, identifying watermarks and visual inconsistencies can help, as errors still occur despite the meteoric progress in generative AI.
AFP has debunked other posts that falsely presented AI generated images and videos here.
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