Fake rescue pleas, AI-generated videos spread after magnitude-7.1 quake strikes Kumamoto

Misinformation — including AI-generated fake news videos and fabricated rescue requests — spread rapidly across social media in the immediate aftermath of a magnitude-7.1 earthquake that struck Japan's Kumamoto Prefecture on Tuesday.

According to NHK on Wednesday, a post appeared on X, formerly Twitter, late Tuesday reading "Please help me. I've been buried alive" and racked up more than 300,000 views.

Verification showed, however, that the address listed by the poster did not exist, and the account was subsequently suspended.

False reports also circulated about Aeon Mall Kumamoto, a large shopping center in Kashima-machi, Kumamoto Prefecture, falsely claiming that an explosion caused by the earthquake had resulted in fatalities.

On YouTube, fabricated videos designed to mimic real broadcast news — produced using generative AI — drew tens of thousands of views.

On X and Threads, footage from the 2024 Noto Peninsula earthquake was recycled and shared as if it depicted the current disaster. Baseless, xenophobic rumors claiming that "foreigners set fires" also spread widely.

The Yomiuri Shimbun reported that conspiracy-theory posts — including claims that the earthquake had been predicted in advance and that it was an "artificial earthquake" — flooded social media shortly after the tremor.

One post, accompanied by a map image and claiming to have pinpointed the exact location of the quake beforehand, reportedly surpassed 3.4 million views.

Furuta Daisuke, editor-in-chief of the Japan Fact-check Center, urged the public to verify sensational information through official announcements from public institutions or reports from news organizations, and to refrain from sharing anything unconfirmed.

Local media and rescue authorities warned that the continued spread of false information could seriously disrupt disaster relief and on-the-ground emergency response.

Japan has faced similar problems before. During the 2016 Kumamoto earthquake, a false rumor that a lion had escaped from a zoo spread online, and during the 2024 Noto Peninsula earthquake, fabricated rescue requests caused confusion among emergency responders.