As news of Iran’s missile tests this week spread, this photo became as ubiquitous as the story itself. In a bizarre twist, it appears upon further investigation that the photo has been altered to show one missile more than originally existed.
From The Lede, a blog on the New York Times website:
In the four-missile version of the image released Wednesday by Sepah News, the media arm of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, two major sections (encircled in red) appear to closely replicate other sections (encircled in orange). (Illustration by The New York Times; photo via Agence France-Presse)
Updated, 9:33 a.m., Agence France-Presse has retracted the image as “apparently digitally altered.”
As news spread across the world of Iran’s provocative missile tests, so did an image of four missiles heading skyward in unison. Unfortunately, it appeared to contain one too many missiles, a point that had not emerged before the photo appeared on the front pages of The Los Angeles Times, The Financial Times, The Chicago Tribune and several other newspapers as well as on BBC News, MSNBC, Yahoo! News, NYTimes.com and many other major news Web sites.
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Agence France-Presse said that it obtained the image from the Web site of Sepah News, the media arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, on Wednesday.
July 10, 2008