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Trace the Information: Did the Hollywood sign catch fire?

SKILL: Trace the Information

DIFFICULTY: Simple

SUBJECT(S): Pop Culture, Politics/Current Events, AI

Students will use a keyword search to learn that viral images and videos of the Hollywood sign on fire are AI-generated.

Related Lesson

CTRL-F Lesson 4: Trace the Information (sign-in required)

Link to Example

Hollywood sign fire (Twitter/X)
Image that appears to be a photograph of the Hollywood sign on fire. Superimposed text reads "AI Generated Image"

Background

This post was written on January 10, 2025.

Out-of-control wildfires in the greater Los Angeles area of California started on January 7th, 2025. At the time of writing, four major wildfires continue to rage and whole neighborhoods have been destroyed.

The Hollywood sign is an iconic landmark overlooking the Hollywood neighbourhood in Los Angeles.

There are now numerous artificial intelligence (AI) programs online, such as Midjourney and Grok, that people can use to create images that look shockingly photorealistic. The AI program is trained on a data-set of thousands of images and uses it to produce new images. The person using the AI art generator can use text to describe what image they want the AI to produce.



About the Example

If you cannot access X/Twitter, click here for a screenshot of the post that you can share with your students.

This post on X/Twitter shares one of many photos and videos that show the iconic Hollywood sign on fire circulating in the midst of multiple deadly wildfires across the Los Angeles area. 

To determine if this is a genuine photo, we can do a reverse image search to see if news outlets or fact-checking organizations have reported on it. However, due to the fact that the image has gone viral, a reverse image search may mostly bring up other places this image appears on social media.

If this is the case we’ll need to switch tactics and use a keyword search to see if we can find any coverage of the story. Using the keywords “hollywood sign fire” we quickly find several articles from professional fact-checking and news organizations. For example, The Independent, Reuters, AFP Fact Check and FullFact identify this and related images as AI-generated. 



Activities 

  1. Show students this post from Twitter/X and have them summarize the claim being made in the photo. 
  2. Have students use the following two techniques to learn more about the context of the image:
    • Reverse image search: Right click on the image and select “Search with Google Lens.”
    • Keyword search: search keywords that describe the image (“hollywood sign fire”) to see what professional sources are saying about this story.

      Note: For demonstrations of these techniques watch: Skill: Search the History of an Image

  3. Have students select an article from a professional news source or fact checking organization. Guiding questions:
    • Is this claim mostly true, mostly false or somewhere in the middle? Explain your reasoning. 
    • On the bottom right hand corner of the image there is a “Grok XI” watermark. What is Grok XI?
    • Is a small watermark like this enough to indicate to viewers that an image or video is AI generated? Why or why not?
    • Why might individuals have created and shared AI generated images of the Hollywood sign on fire?


Related Resources

LESSON: CTRL-F Lesson 4: Trace the Information

VIDEO: Trace the Information (1:54 minutes)

VIDEO: Skill: Search the History of an Image (8:32 minutes)