Anna Hartz
False stories often aim to damage trust and create anger between people.
False information spreads quickly during wars. Social media makes it easy for rumors and fake stories to travel far before anyone checks the facts.
A recent example involves a fake claim about a Ukrainian soldier. The story circulated through Russian Telegram channels and quickly gained attention online.
What the story claimed
The posts shared a screenshot of what looked like a news headline. According to the claim, a soldier from the 47th Brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces had killed his own three-year-old son in the city of Sumy, reports Ukrinform. The message was presented as breaking news.
The story is not true.
The image used in the posts did not come from Ukraine. It showed a dormitory building in a small village in Czechia called Dragomyšl. The building was connected to a different and tragic event that happened earlier this year.
On March 3 a young child in that dormitory was seriously injured after being abused. The child was taken to hospital but died the next day from the injuries. Local authorities in Czechia reported on the case and started an investigation.
Russian propaganda accounts used a photo of the dormitory from that case. They then created a new and false story around it. The fabricated version claimed the death happened in Ukraine and blamed a Ukrainian soldier.
Apart of a broader campaign
There is no evidence that such a crime took place in Sumy. The website of the National Police in the Sumy region has no report of a case like this. Ukrainian media outlets have also not reported any similar incident.
The false story appears to be part of a broader campaign to damage the reputation of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. By spreading shocking claims, propaganda channels try to create distrust between soldiers and civilians.
This method has been used before. Russian propaganda outlets have previously shared fake reports about crimes supposedly committed by Ukrainian soldiers. Some of those stories claimed that recruitment officers had been murdered or that people with autism were being forced into military service.
None of those claims were supported by verified information.
Cases like this show how easily real events can be twisted into false stories online. A photo or a headline taken out of context can quickly turn into a misleading narrative that spreads across social media.
