As photos of children separated from their parents at the border continue to spread online, you can't always be sure that what you're seeing is real.
One viral image allegedly showed young, immigrant boys holding guns while standing along the U.S. border. But is it real?
Verify researchers investigated, and here is what we found:
The photo was shared by the Drudge Report with the caption "Border Battle: USA taking in 250 kids per day." The Drudge Report, a website that aggregates and shares news stories, included the photo with an article from the Washington Examiner about immigrant children crossing the border.
Not long after the photo was shared, several people online claimed that the photo was misleading because it appeared the children were not Latino immigrants.
As it turns out, the image is real, but it was not taken at the border.
The original image was posted in August 2012 on the photo-sharing website Flickr. The children in the photo are actually from Syria. Photographer Christiaan Triebert captured the image when he was in Azaz, Syria where the four young boys held toy guns and posed for his camera.
Treibert called out the Drudge Report for incorrectly using his photo. He also laid all myths to rest in a tweet, saying, "Were gun-toting children photographed on the United States border? No. The Drudge Report used my photo of children holding toy guns in Syria without credit, a description, or attribution to illustrate a story about immigration to the US."
The Drudge Report later swapped out the photo for another that showed a group of people sitting on the ground looking at the camera. But it was actually from an Associated Press photographer in 2013.
So any claims linking either of these photos to the current family separation crisis at the border are FALSE.
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