20-year-old French student fights viral AI misinformation after fake image gets 1M likes

A fake image of two impoverished children sitting in a rain-soaked road with a birthday cake pushed Théodore Cazals to challenge misleading AI content online. The picture, which showed two emaciated children with thick beards, attracted nearly one million likes and heart emojis on Facebook.The 20-year-old student from Paris began an account on X called “Insane AI Slop”, where he mocked and called out images and videos that appeared to fool viewers. People soon began sending him examples, and his account grew to more than 133,000 followers. According to the BBC, his campaign became part of a wider backlash against low-quality AI content spreading.How the French student built an online community against fake AI imagesCazals began his campaign after seeing a Facebook image of two children who appeared emaciated and impoverished. Despite their boyish features, they had thick beards; one had no hands and only one foot. They sat in a busy road in pouring rain beside a birthday cake, while a sign asked people to like the image because it was the child’s birthday.The picture contained signs of the AI generation, yet attracted nearly one million likes and heart emojis. Cazals said the volum...