AI-made images mean seeing is no longer believing

A strange thing happened last week when you searched for “tank man” on Google.

Tap on image results and instead of the usual photos of Tiananmen Square in Beijing, and the iconic image of a brave protester staring down a convoy of tanks that was captured in 1989, the first result was the same historic moment – but from a different point of view.

For a time last week, the first result on Google Images for “tank man” was instead an AI-generated image of the same protester, taking a selfie in front of the tank. The image was created by Midjourney, and was at least six months old. First reported by 404 Media, a new tech journalism startup set up by former Vice News staff, the emergence of the tank man selfie – which Google subsequently removed from search results for “tank man” – highlighted one of the main fears that Eddie Perez, Twitter’s former head of election integrity, highlighted to me in a recent podcast interview: it’s now possible, with the use of AI imagery, to create alternative history. And that has huge ramifications not only on our lives, but also our elections.