“Why doesn’t whale milk mix with the sea?” says the text overlay.<\/p>\n
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Screenshot of false post, captured August 19, 2026, with AI label and red X mark added by AFP.<\/p>\n
The video was also shared in posts written in English<\/a>, Arabic<\/a>, Turkish<\/a>, Hindi<\/a> and\u00a0 Spanish<\/a> — with many social media users appearing to believe it shows genuine wildlife footage.<\/p>\n “Masyallah, the power of God is present in all of His creations,” reads one comment to a Facebook post.<\/p>\n “By the power of Allah SWT, milk and water do not mix,” says another.<\/p>\n However, the clip is inauthentic and part of a wave<\/a> of AI-generated<\/a> wildlife visuals<\/a> that conservationists say endanger animals and people.<\/p>\n AI fakery<\/p>\n Genuine\u00a0 visuals<\/a> of whales\u00a0 feeding<\/a> their young are rare and difficult to film (archived here<\/a> and here<\/a>).<\/p>\n “The last thing we want is to disturb whales while we’re studying them, especially mom-calf pairs, especially nursing, when baby is getting much-needed nutrition,”\u00a0 Kathleen Hunt<\/a>, an associate professor at Oregon State University’s Marine Mammal Institut, told AFP on August 12 ( archived link<\/a>).<\/p>\n The circulating video is “ludicrous”, she said, adding what it depicts is “completely implausible based on anatomy, physics, behaviour and physiology”.<\/p>\n Hunt pointed out several features of the whale in the video that are erroneous.<\/p>\n “The eye is too high up, the lower jaw is the wrong shape,” she said.<\/p>\n Whale calves “put their mouths directly on the mom’s teat when nursing” and “don’t bite at a wiggling sheet of milk,” she added, contrary to the video’s depiction.<\/p>\n “Whale milk wouldn’t hold together like that in seawater,” she continued.<\/p>\n An analysis of the video using Hive Moderation, an AI detection tool, found it was “likely to contain AI-generated or deepfake content”.\u00a0<\/p>\n Screenshot of the Hive Moderation analysis result, taken on August 18, 2026, with AI label added by AFP<\/p>\n A\u00a0 reverse image search<\/a>\u00a0using\u00a0 keyframes<\/a> from the video found the footage was posted on Instagram<\/a> on May\u00a0 26, 2026 in an account that describes itself as an “AI creator” ( archived link<\/a>). The video was also uploaded<\/a> on the same day on the user’s Facebook account ( archived link<\/a>).<\/p>\n The bottom-right corner of the clip bears a watermark for OpenArt.ai<\/a>, a platform for creating AI-generated content ( archived link<\/a>).<\/p>\n Screenshot comparison of circulated AI video from the false post (L) and video from the AI-creator Facebook account<\/p>\n The Instagram account shares hundreds of AI-generated marine animals on its feed; some of them gained millions of views, including the “nursing whale” one.<\/p>\n Screenshot of Instagram account that shared AI-generated content of marine animals, with the “nursing whale” clip and “AI creator” description highlighted by AFP<\/p>\n Hyper-realistic visuals of wild animals behaving like pets, or even like humans, can distort public perceptions of wildlife and harm conservation efforts, AFP previously\u00a0 reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n A September 2025 study<\/a> in the journal Conservation Biology concluded that the rapid spread of AI misinformation and its potential to harm environmental efforts is a “major threat” to society ( archived link<\/a>).<\/p>\n![\"<span>Screenshot](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/https:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en\/afp_factcheck_us_713\/b120aefff7ab68b9f25ba0aca198ce2f.jpg\"\/)
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