#FactCheck: Old Video of India-Pakistan Independence Day Celebrations in London Falsely Linked to Protest Against CEC Gyanesh Kumar
Executive Summary
A video is being shared on social media with the claim that Pakistani flags were waved during a protest against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar in London. CyberPeace Research found that the video is not from a protest against the SIR in London. Instead, it shows a joint event held in London on August 15 to mark the Independence Days of India and Pakistan.
Claim:
Social media users are claiming that more Pakistanis than Indians participated in a protest against the SIR in London, with several Pakistani flags visible during the demonstration. The post links the alleged presence of Pakistanis to Pakistan’s purported interest in the protests against the SIR in India and suggests that the demonstration was part of a larger conspiracy against Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
https://x.com/rrakesh_pandey/status/2111720154795233494?s=20
Fact Check
During our research into the viral video claiming that Pakistani flags were waved during a protest against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar in London, a keyword search led us to the same video uploaded on the Instagram account of a Pakistani man, Amir Hashmi, on October 17. Notably, the video was uploaded on the same day that protests against Gyanesh Kumar were held in London.
https://www.instagram.com/reels/DemgSnHNRot/
During our research, we also found a video uploaded on August 16, 2026, to the Instagram account of the same individual, Pakistani singer Amir Hashmi, who is based in London. The video contained visuals matching those seen in the viral clip. The accompanying caption stated that the footage showed celebrations marking the Independence Days of Pakistan and India jointly at Piccadilly Circus in London.
According to another post on Amir Hashmi’s Instagram account, the event was held at Piccadilly Circus on August 15, 2026, local time in England.
https://www.instagram.com/reels/Db9A0paoIvh/
Conclusion
The evidence gathered during our research confirms that the video being shared with the claim that Pakistani flags were waved during a protest against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar in London actually shows an event held on August 15. However, the Pakistani singer shared the video on October 17, the same day protests against Gyanesh Kumar took place in London.
Related Blogs
Executive Summary
A shocking video claiming to show snakes raining down from the sky is going viral on social media. The clip shows what appear to be cobras and pythons falling in large numbers instead of rain, while people are seen running in panic through a marketplace. The video is being shared with the claim that it is the result of “tampering with nature” and that sudden snake rainfall occurred in an unidentified country. (Links and archived versions provided)
CyberPeace researched the viral claim and found it to be false. The video does not depict a real incident. Instead, it has been generated using artificial intelligence (AI).
Fact Check
To verify the authenticity of the video, we extracted keyframes and conducted a reverse image search using Google Lens. However, we did not find any credible media report linked to the viral footage. We also searched relevant keywords on Google but found no reliable national or international news coverage supporting the claim. If snakes had genuinely rained from the sky in any country, the incident would have received widespread media attention globally. A frame-by-frame analysis of the video revealed multiple inconsistencies and visual anomalies:
In the first two seconds, a massive snake appears to fall onto electric wires, yet its body passes unrealistically through the wires — something that is physically impossible. The snakes falling from the sky and crawling on the ground move in an unnatural manner. Instead of falling under gravity, they appear to float mid-air. Around the 9–10 second mark, a person lying on the ground has a visibly distorted hand structure, a common artifact seen in AI-generated videos.
Such irregularities are typical indicators of AI-generated content. The viral video was further analyzed using the AI detection tool Hive Moderation, which indicated a 96.5% probability that the video was AI-generated.
Additionally, image detection tool WasitAI also classified the visuals in the viral clip as highly likely to be AI-generated.
Conclusion
CyberPeace ’s research confirms that the viral video claiming to show snakes raining from the sky is not authentic. The footage has been created using artificial intelligence and does not depict a real event.
Executive Summary
A postcard featuring BJP leader Manoj Tiwari is being widely shared on social media with a purported statement attributed to him. The viral postcard claims that Tiwari suggested that if people stopped using the ₹1 coin and treated ₹2 as ₹1, the value of the dollar would automatically come down to ₹45. Users are sharing the post claiming that the BJP leader made the bizarre suggestion to strengthen the Indian rupee against the US dollar.
However, research by the CyberPeace Research Wing found the claim to be false. Manoj Tiwari never made any such statement regarding the rupee and the dollar. The BJP MP himself has dismissed the viral claim as fake.
Claim
TMC leader Kirti Azad shared the viral postcard on X and wrote, “As received on X, forwarded as it is. India is truly blessed with such brilliant minds.”
https://x.com/KirtiAzaad/status/2055905987115233473?s=20
Fact Check
A keyword search on Google did not yield any credible media reports suggesting that Manoj Tiwari had made such a statement. No reliable source was found to support the viral claim. Further research led to a clarification posted on Manoj Tiwari’s official Facebook page. In the video statement, Tiwari categorically denied making any such remark about the rupee and the dollar. He stated that the viral claim being circulated in his name was completely fake.
Manoj Tiwari’s clarification video on Facebook
Conclusion
The viral claim is false. Manoj Tiwari never made any statement suggesting that stopping the use of ₹1 and treating ₹2 as ₹1 would strengthen the rupee against the dollar. He has himself denied the claim and called it fake.
Introduction
The geographical world has physical boundaries, but the digital one has a different architecture and institutions are underprepared when it comes to addressing cybersecurity breaches. Cybercrime, which may lead to economic losses, privacy violations, national security threats and have psycho-social consequences, is forecast to continuously increase between 2024 and 2029, reaching an estimated cost of at least 6.4 trillion U.S. dollars (Statista). As cyber threats become persistent and ubiquitous, they are becoming a critical governance challenge. Lawmakers around the world need to collaborate on addressing this emerging issue.
Cybersecurity Governance and its Structural Elements
Cybersecurity governance refers to the strategies, policies, laws, and institutional frameworks that guide national and international preparedness and responses to cyber threats to governments, private entities, and individuals. Effective cybersecurity governance ensures that digital risks are managed proactively while balancing security with fundamental rights like privacy and internet freedom. It includes, but is not limited to :
- Policies and Legal Frameworks: Laws that define the scope of cybercrime, cybersecurity responsibilities, and mechanisms for data protection. Eg: India’s National Cybersecurity Policy (NCSP) of 2013, Information Technology Act, 2000, and Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023, EU’s Cybersecurity Act (2019), Cyber Resilience Act (2024), Cyber Solidarity Act (2025), and NIS2 Directive (2022), South Africa’s Cyber Crimes Act (2021), etc.
- Regulatory Bodies: Government agencies such as data protection authorities, cybersecurity task forces, and other sector-specific bodies. Eg: India’s Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In), Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C), Europe’s European Union Agency for Cybersecurity (ENISA), and others.
- Public-Private Knowledge Sharing: The sharing of the private sector’s expertise and the government’s resources plays a crucial role in improving enforcement and securing critical infrastructure. This model of collaboration is followed in the EU, Japan, Turkey, and the USA.
- Research and Development: Apart from the technical, the cyber domain also includes military, politics, economy, law, culture, society, and other elements. Robust, multi-sectoral research is necessary for formulating international and regional frameworks on cybersecurity.
Challenges to Cybersecurity Governance
Governments face several challenges in securing cyberspace and protecting critical assets and individuals despite the growing focus on cybersecurity. This is because so far the focus has been on cybersecurity management, which, considering the scale of attacks in the recent past, is not enough. Stakeholders must start deliberating on the aspect of governance in cyberspace while ensuring that this process is multi-consultative. (Savaş & Karataş 2022). Prominent challenges which need to be addressed are:
- Dynamic Threat Landscape: The threat landscape in cyberspace is ever-evolving. Bad actors are constantly coming up with new ways to carry out attacks, using elements of surprise, adaptability, and asymmetry aided by AI and quantum computing. While cybersecurity measures help mitigate risks and minimize damage, they can’t always provide definitive solutions. E.g., the pace of malware development is much faster than that of legal norms, legislation, and security strategies for the protection of information technology (IT). (Efe and Bensghir 2019).
- Regulatory Fragmentation and Compliance Challenges: Different countries, industries, or jurisdictions may enforce varying or conflicting cybersecurity laws and standards, which are still evolving and require rapid upgrades. This makes it harder for businesses to comply with regulations, increases compliance costs, and jeopardizes the security posture of the organization.
- Trans-National Enforcement Challenges: Cybercriminals operate across jurisdictions, making threat intelligence collection, incident response, evidence-gathering, and prosecution difficult. Without cross-border agreements between law enforcement agencies and standardized compliance frameworks for organizations, bad actors have an advantage in getting away with attacks.
- Balancing Security with Digital Rights: Striking a balance between cybersecurity laws and privacy concerns (e.g., surveillance laws vs. data protection) remains a profound challenge, especially in areas of CSAM prevention and identifying terrorist activities. Without a system of checks and balances, it is difficult to prevent government overreach into domains like journalism, which are necessary for a healthy democracy, and Big Tech’s invasion of user privacy.
The Road Ahead: Strengthening Cybersecurity Governance
All domains of human life- economy, culture, politics, and society- occur in digital and cyber environments now. It follows naturally, that governance in the physical world translates into governance in cyberspace. It must be underpinned by features consistent with the principles of openness, transparency, participation, and accountability, while also protecting human rights. In cyberspace, the world is stateless and threats are rapidly evolving with innovations in modern computing. Thus, cybersecurity governance requires a global, multi-sectoral approach utilizing the rules of international law, to chart out problems, and solutions, and carry out detailed risk analyses. (Savaş & Karataş 2022).
References
- https://www.statista.com/forecasts/1280009/cost-cybercrime-worldwide#statisticContainer
- https://link.springer.com/article/10.1365/s43439-021-00045-4#citeas
- https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/cybersecurity-policies#ecl-inpage-cybersecurity-strategy
