KRAKOW, POLAND - 2022/02/27: A protester holds a placard with a Time magazine cover showing Russian ... [+]
It may never be as iconic as the United States Marines raising the flag on Iwo Jima or as moving as the image of Phan Thi Kim Phuc – aka the "Napalm Girl" – captured in the Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph taken at Trảng Bàng during the Vietnam War, but it is likely the video of a Ukrainian tractor driver stealing a Russian armored personnel carrier (APC) highlights the power social media could have in this latest conflict.
If it is real that is.
While the video has since gone viral and has been seen more than 4.8 million times, it remains unclear if it is authentic and even where it was filmed. The timing is also notable as Ukraine's National Agency for the Protection against Corruption (NAPC) declared that captured Russian tanks and other equipment are not subject to declaration, nor will those items be taxed!
"Have you captured a Russian tank or armored personnel carrier and are worried about how to declare it? Keep calm and continue to defend the Motherland! There is no need to declare the captured Russian tanks and other equipment, because the cost of this ... does not exceed 100 living wages (UAH 248,100)," NAPC's press service said in a statement to the Interfax Ukraine news agency.
Spread of Information Or Misinformation?
Social media offers the ability for those in Ukraine to provide a real time view from the ground that wasn't previously possible. Yet, some of what has been posted seems fantastical, and almost too good to be true.
In another video shared in recent days, a Ukrainian man from Berdyansk, in the Zaporizhzhia Oblast region of the country, was seen picking a landmine up with his bare hands and removing it from the road.
While it seems authentic, many other videos and images are now being called into question.
The First Casualty?
It has often been said that the first casualty of war is the truth, and in the case of social media there have also been a number of photos and videos that have been posted and falsely associated with the Russian invasion.
"Multiple videos and images circulating on social media were taken in previous years and are not linked with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, various fact-checkers and journalists report. Fact-checking organizations shared tips and toolkits to help with the verification of content online," Twitter warned.
News organizations are also fact checking what is being shared across the platforms.
"A TikTok video showing how to operate Russian military tanks predates the invasion of Ukraine by a year, and was created by a Russian - not Ukrainian – blogger," Reuters Fact Check tweeted on Tuesday afternoon.
Not This Time
It isn't just footage from Ukraine that is causing some confusion on social media this week. A fake Time magazine cover that featured a mash-up of Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin and Nazi Germany's Adolf Hitler also went viral.
"If you've seen this image that looks like a TIME Magazine cover, it's not really in publication. It's a series of three pieces created by artist Patrick Mulder to 'add to the conversation around the invasion of Ukraine,'" noted fact checking service VERIFY (@VerifyThis).
Patrick Mulder, the Welsh artist and graphic designer responsible for the artwork, said it was not meant to deceive. He confirmed that he created the three-part series of illustrations on the day that Russia invaded Ukraine, and that it was only meant as an artistic representation of current events.
"I never, ever intended for people to think it was real. It was a piece of artwork that many others saved, reposted without mentioning the fact that it was art, not a legitimate cover, and it spread like wildfire," Mulder told Snopes.
"My TIME artwork has gone viral - so I thought it would be appropriate for me to write a little about it. The image is one out of a sequence of three I created on the day Russia invaded Ukraine. I felt the official cover by TIME was uninspired and lacked conviction," Mulder (@MrPatrickMulder) further explained in a tweet.
Truly the lines between propaganda, social commentary and misinformation are blurring on social media.
