#FactCheck-Old Maharashtra Video of Dancing Policemen Falsely Linked to West Bengal Election Results
Executive Summary
A video showing police personnel dancing on the streets along with civilians is going viral on social media. The clip is being shared with the claim that policemen in West Bengal were celebrating the defeat of Mamata Banerjee and the victory of the BJP.
Research by CyberPeace Research Wing found that the claim is misleading. The viral video is old and unrelated to the West Bengal elections.
Claim
An X user shared the video on April 26, 2026, alleging that police personnel were celebrating BJP’s victory. The post questioned those raising concerns over EVMs, suggesting that even police were openly rejoicing over the election outcome.
- https://x.com/Minakshishriyan/status/2051490074957930510
- https://archive.is/d81OT
Fact Check
To verify the claim, we extracted keyframes from the viral video and conducted a reverse image search. This led us to a Reddit post dated September 13, 2022, where the same video was shared. The post described it as footage from Ganesh Visarjan celebrations in India, and several users in the comments identified the location as Maharashtra.
Further research led us to a YouTube channel “Yash Arate Vlogs,” which uploaded the same video on September 10, 2022. The description stated that the clip was recorded during Ganpati immersion celebrations in Kolhapur.
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/0_w5t-4rmTY
We also found media reports from September 2022 indicating that during Ganesh Visarjan in Kolhapur, loud music and festive atmosphere led even on-duty police personnel to briefly join the celebrations.
Conclusion
Our research confirms that the viral video does not show any post-election celebration in West Bengal. It is an old clip from Maharashtra, recorded during Ganesh Visarjan festivities, and is being falsely shared with a misleading political claim.
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Introduction
Betting has long been associated with sporting activities and has found a growing presence in online gaming and esports globally. As the esports industry continues to expand, Statista has projected that it will reach a market value of $5.9 billion by 2029. As such, associated markets have also seen significant growth. In 2024, this segment accounted for an estimated $2.5 billion globally. While such engagement avenues are popular among international audiences, they also bring attention to concerns around regulation, integrity, and user protection. As esports builds its credibility and reach, especially among younger demographics, these aspects become increasingly important to address in policy and practice.
What Does Esports Betting Involve?
Much like traditional sports, esports engagement in some regions includes the practice of wagering on teams, players, or match outcomes. But it is inherently more complex. The accurate valuation of odds in online gaming and esports can be complicated by frequently updated game titles, changing teams, and shifting updates to game mechanics (called metas- most effective strategies). Bets can be placed using real money, virtual items like skins (digital avatars), or increasingly, cryptocurrency.
Esports and Wagering: Emerging Issues and Implications
- Legal Grey Areas: While countries like South Korea and some USA states have dedicated regulations for esports betting and licensed bookmaking, most do not. This creates legal grey areas for betting service providers to access unregulated markets, increasing the risk of fraud, money laundering, and exploitation of bettors in those regions.
- The Skill v/s Chance Dilemma: Most gambling laws across the world regulate betting based on the distinction between ‘games of skill’ and ‘games of chance’. Betting on the latter is typically illegal, since winning depends on chance. But the definitions of ‘skill’ and ‘chance’ may vary by jurisdiction. Also, esports betting often blurs into gambling. Outcomes may depend on player skill, but in-game economies like skin betting and unpredictable gameplay introduce elements of chance, complicating regulation and making enforcement difficult.
- Underage Gambling and Addiction Risks: Players are often minors and are exposed to the gambling ecosystem due to gamified betting through reward systems like loot boxes. These often mimic the mechanics of betting, normalising gambling behaviours among young users before they fully understand the risks. This can lead to the development of addictive behaviours.
- Match-Fixing and Loss of Integrity: Esports are particularly susceptible to match-fixing because of weak regulation, financial pressures, and the anonymity of online betting. Instances like the Dota 2 Southeast Asia Scandals (2023) and Valorant match-fixing in North America (2021) can jeopardise audience trust and sponsorships. This affects the trustworthiness of minor tournaments, where talent is discovered.
- Cybersecurity and Data Risks: Esports betting apps collect sensitive user data, making them an attractive target for cybercrime. Bettors are susceptible to identity theft, financial fraud, and data breaches, especially on unlicensed platforms.
Way Forward
To strengthen trust, ensure user safety, and protect privacy within the esports ecosystem, responsible management of betting practices can be achieved through targeted interventions focused on:
- National-Level Regulations: Countries like India have a large online gaming and esports market. It will need to create a regulatory authority along the lines of the UK’s Gambling Commission and update its gambling laws to protect consumers.
- Protection of Minors: Setting guardrails such as age verification, responsible advertising, anti-fraud mechanisms, self-exclusion tools, and spending caps can help to keep a check on gambling by minors.
- Harmonizing Global Standards: Since esports is inherently global, aligning core regulatory principles across jurisdictions (such as through multi-country agreements or voluntary industry codes of conduct) can help create consistency while avoiding overregulation.
- Co-Regulation: Governments, esports organisers, betting platforms, and player associations should work closely to design effective, well-informed policies. This can help uphold the interests of all stakeholders in the industry.
Conclusion
Betting in esports is inevitable. But the industry faces a double dilemma- overregulating on the one hand, or letting gambling go unchecked, on the other. Both can be detrimental to its growth. This is why there is a need for industry actors like policymakers, platforms and organisers to work together to harmonise legal inconsistencies, protect vulnerable users and invest in forming data security. Forming industry-wide ethics boards, promoting regional regulatory dialogue, and instating transparency measures for betting operators can be a step in this direction to ensure that esports evolves into a mature, trusted global industry.
Sources
Introduction
With the modernization of automobiles, so have the methods employed by criminals who seek to commit thefts. The old method of smashing a car window or bypassing an engine lock is no longer prevalent. Modern car thieves employ cloning techniques for keys and digital signals, and sophisticated methods to commit crimes without any traces left behind. In an era where intelligence is crucial, the forensic examination of car keys has become an indispensable tool for investigations, providing clues buried within ordinary car keys.
The Need for Car Key Forensics Today
Daily, thousands of cars worth millions are being hacked or stolen around the globe. The shocking thing is that most of these hacks do not have any sign of breakage or forced entry. It is because the thieves use vulnerabilities in the wireless key systems to unlock the vehicles without leaving any trace behind. Therefore, car-key forensics has now become more important than ever before.
Forensic Value of Smart Key
The smart key is not just comprised of locking and unlocking features for vehicles. Actually, it operates as a miniature computer within the key itself. Information such as pairing records, frequency of use, or the last instance that the key was used to unlock something could be contained in smart keys, thus offering evidence of any criminal activity conducted using these items.
Patterns of Vehicle Theft
Through the examination of the chip in a key, one will be able to establish whether the key was legally programmed or had been tampered with by some other means. Such forensics become more important when trying to detect and monitor any car theft rings, which employ cloning machines or software.
Confirming Ownership and Authenticity
In cases involving insurance claims or fraud, smart key data can help confirm whether the person making a claim actually owned or used the car during the incident. It’s digital proof that goes beyond what paperwork or statements can show.
Strengthening Legal Cases
When brought to court, data doesn’t lie. A properly handled forensic examination of a car key can provide hard evidence — the kind that holds up under questioning and supports or disproves claims with complete accuracy. In many cases, this small device becomes the most reliable witness in the investigation.
A Real-Life Example
Consider the following scenario: An expensive SUV is stolen from a parking lot secured with security surveillance. No one is captured on camera and there is no sign of forced entry. After days of investigation, the police end up arresting a suspect with a smart key.
During forensic analysis of the smart key, it is revealed that:
- The transponder has an ID number which can be matched against the immobilizer installed in the vehicle.
- The rolling code counter has been incremented in such a way that the date corresponds with the report of theft of the vehicle.
- The extracted information helps match the pair timestamp of the key with the particular make and model of the vehicle.
All this from a single piece of evidence – the smart key.
Inside a Smart Key: Where the Data Lives
An average smart key is not only a remote but also a multi-level set of data carriers:
- Plastic Shell– could include serial numbers and information on the manufacture.
- Battery – helps calculate the time of using the key or detect any modifications.
- Antenna Coil – sends encrypted information to the immobilizer of a car. Draw the picture of this element.
- Microchip / EEPROM – holds key identification code, rolling code, VIN number, and/or other information of the vehicle.
- Buttons / sensors – could record any pressing or transmission actions in some cases.
All the little devices above, once properly studied via forensics software, provide valuable information.
How the Investigator Uncovers the Truth
In relation to investigating the true story about a vehicle, it is no different than handling other forms of digital evidence, as forensic analysts treat the car key in the same way. It is nothing more than an encrypted device in your hands, and using special techniques, they are able to reveal the information contained within the device.
Some of the methods used by modern forensic laboratories include:
1. Intercepting Radio Signals
Any intelligent key transmits radio signals to communicate with a car. Specialists employ advanced antennas and radio frequency (RF) analysers to catch and analyse them. This way, it is possible to understand the interaction between the key and the car – how often was it used, what kind of authentication procedure takes place, and if the signal matches the car’s one or has been forged somehow.
2. Checking Out the Key’s Brain (Analysis of EEPROM)
There is always a special chip on the key that is responsible for its activity. The chip contains an important memory module (EEPROM – Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory), which holds various data, including key IDs and rolling codes. It can be carefully retrieved via advanced tools. Thus, it is possible to determine whether somebody tried to tamper with the key.
3. The Correlation between the Key and Car’s Information
The information stored inside the key will not be used separately since investigators will correlate the key's data with that of the vehicle itself (ECU and immobilizer). If the two kinds of information coincide, the investigation may conclude that the key belongs to the vehicle. Otherwise, this may mean either cloning or tampering.
4. Identifying the Tampering and Cloning Evidence
As was mentioned above, thieves sometimes resort to using unlawful programming devices for duplicating smart car keys. In order to detect possible cloning, experts examine the key using various diagnostic devices to find out whether the keys were modified by changing the encryption code, frequencies, and hardware itself.
At the end of the process, some kind of miracle occurs because of the following: all actions committed with this particular key become documented, recorded inside the device itself. Even if someone tries to hide anything or remove any information concerning this particular incident, there will always remain some data.
Car Key Forensics in the Future
The evolution of cars to connect with other devices and adopt self-driving technologies requires new investigative methods to be used for vehicle-related crimes. Advanced car keys or smartphone apps that replace physical keys will likely incorporate biometric authentication, cloud integration, or blockchain records of key activity in the near future.
Such improvements will pose several threats and offer many benefits:
- Artificial intelligence tools can determine if the car key is cloned based on its behaviour pattern.
- Blockchain validation ensures all key-related activities are recorded and cannot be altered.
- Cyber-forensic protocols will become increasingly necessary for investigating criminal activity related to vehicles.
Car key forensics technology will not only allow solving crimes but may become instrumental in crime prevention.
Conclusion
A car key in this era is more than just an unlocking mechanism; it is a miniature data storage facility, which can yield information about the user, intentions, and access rights. The more cars become technologically advanced, the more the examination of smart keys becomes necessary as part of correlating physical evidence with digital investigation. It clearly indicates how small objects such as keys can play pivotal roles in cracking cases.
Introduction
In April 2026, Anthropic revealed Claude Mythos, an artificial intelligence application capable of finding security flaws in computer networks more effectively than human beings. The corporation claimed to have found hundreds of thousands of substantially serious vulnerabilities in established desktop operating systems and web-based browsers that have not been used for at least 20 years. This news has greatly alarmed those responsible for leading financial organisations, banks, and governments throughout the world. Nevertheless, this news demonstrates a much larger problem: we do not have enough cybersecurity professionals trained to do this kind of work. At the current estimate, there are 4.8 million cyber security professionals short of what is needed globally. There is a need to develop different kinds of workforce training programs to help prepare these professionals as we continue to see the emergence of new AI technologies.
What Is Claude Mythos ?
Anthropic created Claude Mythos as part of its Claude AI system, competing against ChatGPT and Google Gemini. In April 2026, expert testing revealed Mythos excelled at identifying problems in legacy code and suggested exploitation methods. It found a vulnerability that had existed for 27 years. Because of these advanced capabilities, Anthropic restricted access through “Project Glasswing,” giving it only to 12 major tech companies and 40 organizations managing critical software. Canadian Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne called it an “unknown unknown.” Andrew Bailey of the Bank of England said regulators needed to examine what Mythos could mean for financial attacks. The European Union raised concerns. India’s Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman warned at SEBI’s Foundation Day on April 25, 2026, that cybersecurity is the single most pressing challenge facing markets today. She stated a single successful cyberattack on a major exchange or large broker could disrupt markets nationally and shake public confidence for years. Sitharaman emphasized that AI tools make attacks faster, more adaptive, and autonomous, capable of discovering system vulnerabilities and manipulating code.
The Real Problem: Discovery Versus Fixing
Mythos highlights a fundamental mismatch in cybersecurity. Finding a vulnerability does not guarantee it will be fixed. Organizations face challenges patching systems. Many use obsolete technology, and updates can break dependent components. Organizations in developing nations often lack financial resources for repairs or downtime. Critical systems like hospitals, banks, and power grids cannot go offline. Before Mythos, human hackers found vulnerabilities slowly. Now AI tools find weaknesses faster than they can be fixed, creating a dangerous gap. Ciaran Martin, former head of the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre, explained that Mythos is “a really good hacker” against unprotected systems. Organizations following basic security practices—regular updates, strong passwords, network protection, trained staff can likely defend against it. The UK AI Safety Institute concluded Mythos poses the biggest threat to poorly defended systems, noting: “We cannot say for sure whether Mythos Preview would be able to attack well-defended systems.”
The Workforce Challenge
The Mythos announcement exposes the real problem: we lack enough trained cybersecurity workers. There is a global shortage of 4.8 million workers against a current workforce of 5.5 million. In AI security specifically, 34 percent of needed skills are missing. But the harder problem is that AI is changing needed skills. Entry-level jobs monitoring security alerts are being automated. These were traditional career starting points. Young people learned basic skills and moved to advanced roles. Now these positions disappear while new AI security jobs emerge for which nobody has training. Organizations cannot hire fast enough for new AI roles because few people have these skills. This leads to a vicious cycle. With fewer entry-level positions available, there will be fewer young adults entering the job market which results in even fewer workers with this skill set; thus, the shortage of qualified applicants increases; this thereby increases organizations’ vulnerability. Without action taken immediately, this issue will continue to worsen
Way Forward
- Clarify What Skills We Need
Governments and industry must work together to define what cybersecurity workers need in an AI world. Currently, aspiring professionals study networking, software, and vulnerability finding, but AI security training barely exists. Governments should work with universities and companies to clarify needed skills: understanding what AI tools can and cannot do in security, finding and fixing AI system problems.
- Support Workers Who Lose Jobs To Automation
Workers who find themselves losing their jobs due to automation will require government support. All too often without an alternative, these skilled and trained workers will leave their profession forever. The government will need to provide funding for training of displaced employees, support for those changing careers to become cyber security professionals.
- Create Clear Rules For AI Security Tools
When companies create powerful security tools, governments must understand their capabilities and risks. Companies should be required to thoroughly test tools before release, clearly explain what tools can do and their limitations, and explain safety and misuse prevention plans. Governments should monitor actual tool usage, not simply trust voluntary compliance.
- Focus On Basic Security First
Most attacks do not need advanced AI tools. They succeed because organizations have not implemented basic security. Some never update software, train employees, use strong passwords, protect data properly, or test defenses. Governments should require organizations, especially those managing critical systems, to implement these basics.
Conclusion
Claude Mythos matters not because it is a weapon of destruction, but because it forces hard questions: Do we have enough skilled workers? Are our systems well-protected? The answer is no. We face a shortage of 4.8 million cybersecurity workers and lack AI security training. Yet this is also an opportunity. Governments can invest in training, strengthen defenses, and create clear rules for AI security tools. Governments, organizations and educational institutions must collaborate to create viable Cybersecurity career pathways. We can act through either creating panic or creating a trained and prepared workforce to meet today’s challenges. The time is now.
References
- https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/crk1py1jgzko
- https://red.anthropic.com/2026/mythos-preview/
- https://www.anthropic.com/project/glasswing
- https://www.aisi.gov.uk/blog/our-evaluation-of-claude-mythos-previews-cyber-capabilities
- https://www.bsg.ox.ac.uk/people/ciaran-martin
- https://www.isc2.org/Insights/2024/10/Cybersecurity-Workforce-INSIGHTS-October-2024
- https://decrypt.co/364141/anthropic-claude-mythos-serious-threat-overhyped-ai-security-institute
- https://www.businesstoday.in/latest/economy/story/fm-nirmala-sitharaman-wants-sebi-regulated-entities-to-remain-exceptionally-vigilant-heres-why-527437-2026-04-25
- https://www.theweek.in/news/biz-tech/2026/04/25/sebi-38th-anniversary-cybersecurity-concerns.html
