A black-and-white photo, which purportedly shows a young Congress leader Sonia Gandhi smoking a cigarette, has gone viral on social media.
![The photo, which originally shows an unidentified woman, has been altered to resemble Sonia Gandhi.](https://images.thequint.com/thequint%2F2024-07%2Fb21c2db3-d6ed-4ff7-9368-084a8c593325%2FScreenshot%202024-07-17%20at%202.26.13%E2%80%AFPM.png?auto=format%2Ccompress&fmt=webp&width=720)
An archive of this post can be seen here.
(Source: Facebook/Screenshot)
How did we find out the truth?: We ran a reverse image search across all platforms, using InVID, a verification extension on Google Chrome.
Google's fact-check explorer tool, which helps users find old versions of an image on the internet, returned results with several links to SoundCloud, a music hosting and streaming platform.
All SoundCloud links dated back to 2015, and other results in the explorer showed that the image had been shared in 2016 and 2017 onwards as well.
![The photo, which originally shows an unidentified woman, has been altered to resemble Sonia Gandhi.](https://images.thequint.com/thequint%2F2024-07%2F6b68b747-f404-4e84-9e2f-7872fd5a6d2d%2FScreenshot%202024-07-17%20at%202.32.00%E2%80%AFPM.png?auto=format%2Ccompress&fmt=webp&width=720)
The tool showed us that the image has been on the internet since 2015.
(Source: Google/Screenshot)
One of the SoundCloud links showed a photo of another woman, not Gandhi, which was used as album art for a song shared nine years ago — in 2015.
![The photo, which originally shows an unidentified woman, has been altered to resemble Sonia Gandhi.](https://images.thequint.com/thequint%2F2024-07%2Fbbda0390-2a01-4a9d-b34c-b2fae664fd72%2FScreenshot%202024-07-17%20at%202.34.15%E2%80%AFPM.png?auto=format%2Ccompress&fmt=webp&width=720)
The album art for this song resembled the viral image.
(Source: SoundCloud/Screenshot)
One of the more recent results, which was a post on X (formerly Twitter), also carried the photograph, where it was shared with the caption "Ghazale Photographed By Farzad Sarfarazi, 2012."
![The photo, which originally shows an unidentified woman, has been altered to resemble Sonia Gandhi.](https://images.thequint.com/thequint%2F2024-07%2F62f21e94-56a6-4139-904f-f6ebc659a3f5%2FScreenshot%202024-07-17%20at%202.37.11%E2%80%AFPM.png?auto=format%2Ccompress&fmt=webp&width=720)
One post mentioned that the photo showed a woman named Ghazale, who was photographed by one Farzad Sarfarazi in 2012.
(Source: X/Screenshot)
On comparing this photo to the viral image in the claim, one can clearly see the similarities.
![The photo, which originally shows an unidentified woman, has been altered to resemble Sonia Gandhi.](https://images.thequint.com/thequint%2F2024-07%2F5b8c1a22-df90-4bed-8109-8668f3499e2e%2F3.png?auto=format%2Ccompress&fmt=webp&width=720)
Both images closely resemble each other.
(Source: X/Altered by The Quint)
Use of AI tools: To check whether the image had been altered using Artificial Intelligence tools, we submitted the viral photograph to True Media and Illuminarty, which help identify images created or manipulated with AI.
True Media's tool mentioned that it found "substantial evidence of manipulation."
![The photo, which originally shows an unidentified woman, has been altered to resemble Sonia Gandhi.](https://images.thequint.com/thequint%2F2024-07%2Ff2698931-4108-4c87-a0ba-4269f903ef10%2FScreenshot%202024-07-17%20at%203.08.13%E2%80%AFPM.png?auto=format%2Ccompress&fmt=webp&width=720)
True Media's tool detected that the image was manipulated.
(Source: TrueMedia/Screenshot)
It expressed a strong certainty that the original image was altered using AI tools.
![The photo, which originally shows an unidentified woman, has been altered to resemble Sonia Gandhi.](https://images.thequint.com/thequint%2F2024-07%2Fb7a8cc2f-0d7b-4441-b4ac-2adafd73c2d6%2FScreenshot%202024-07-17%20at%203.08.36%E2%80%AFPM.png?auto=format%2Ccompress&fmt=webp&width=720)
The tool was confident about the use of AI in manipulating the image.
(Source: TrueMedia/Screenshot)
Illuminarty, which only shows the likelihood of an image being AI-generated, pegged the probability of the image being made by AI tools at 79.4 percent.
![The photo, which originally shows an unidentified woman, has been altered to resemble Sonia Gandhi.](https://images.thequint.com/thequint%2F2024-07%2F772eb0ac-eb02-44e3-a6bf-763f36a74e17%2FScreenshot%202024-07-17%20at%203.06.16%E2%80%AFPM.png?auto=format%2Ccompress&fmt=webp&width=720)
Illuminarty was nearly 80 percent sure that the image was made with AI.
(Source: Illuminarty/Screenshot)
Next, we looked for online pages that allow people to edit faces onto other images, such as Faceswapper.ai and submitted the original image along with a photo of Gandhi.
![The photo, which originally shows an unidentified woman, has been altered to resemble Sonia Gandhi.](https://images.thequint.com/thequint%2F2024-07%2F05986e3a-1ec4-4d5f-bff1-392d9a91f6c7%2FScreenshot%202024-07-17%20at%203.29.32%E2%80%AFPM.png?auto=format%2Ccompress&fmt=webp&width=720)
We submitted the original photo and a photo of Gandhi.
(Source: Faceswapper.ai/Screenshot)
The obtained result closely resembled the viral photo from the claim.
![The photo, which originally shows an unidentified woman, has been altered to resemble Sonia Gandhi.](https://images.thequint.com/thequint%2F2024-07%2Fb78d3537-be51-4a03-b82e-300cf28f09e9%2FScreenshot%202024-07-17%20at%203.30.19%E2%80%AFPM.png?auto=format%2Ccompress&fmt=webp&width=720)
We were able to obtain a result similar to the image in the viral claim.
(Source: Faceswapper.ai/Screenshot)
Conclusion: An edited image has gone viral with the false claim that it shows a young Sonia Gandhi smoking a cigarette.
(Not convinced of a post or information you came across online and want it verified? Send us the details on WhatsApp at 9540511818 , or e-mail it to us at webqoof@thequint.com and we'll fact-check it for you. You can also read all our fact-checked stories here.)
(At The Quint, we are answerable only to our audience. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member. Because the truth is worth it.)