Viral videos falsely shared as Tibet's recent earthquake
On January 7, a powerful earthquake struck Tibet, causing widespread destruction and claiming over 100 lives. Following the disaster, two different videos went viral on social media, with claims that they depicted scenes from Tibet’s recent earthquake. However, verification revealed that these claims are false. The videos in question are actually footage from an earthquake that struck Japan in January 2024, specifically in the Noto Peninsula of Honshu Island. Footage from last year’s earthquake in Japan has been split into two separate videos and is being falsely circulated on social media as scenes from the recent earthquake in Tibet.
Verification of the First Video
Several Facebook posts (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) and YouTube uploads (1, 2, 3) shared a one-minute video, claiming it to be from the recent Tibetan earthquake. Descriptions on these posts and videos stated that the footage showed the devastation in Tibet or “China’s Tibet.”
To verify the authenticity of the viral video, Dismislab conducted a reverse image search using keyframes from the footage. This search led to reports from Japanese national media outlets, including a February 2, 2024, article by Nippon Television (NTV). The article, accompanied by a YouTube video, detailed scenes from the Noto Peninsula earthquake.
Upon translating the Japanese article via Google Translate, it was revealed that the video depicted footage from a car’s dashboard camera during the January 1, 2024, earthquake. The NTV video’s segment from 31 seconds to 1 minute and 25 seconds matches the viral video, confirming that the clip was cut and repurposed to falsely represent the Tibetan earthquake.
Another Japanese media outlet, The Mainichi, also reported on the same footage. Their English-language report described how a dashboard camera belonging to a nursing home operator for the elderly in Suzu named ‘Choujukai’ in Ishikawa Prefecture captured the intensity of the Noto Peninsula earthquake. The footage was shared by the social welfare organization to be used as a lesson for future disaster prevention measures.
Additional confirmation came from a BBC Bangla report uncovered through a keyword search. The report detailed the January 1, 2024, earthquake in Noto, which registered a magnitude of 7.6 on the Richter scale and resulted in 48 fatalities.
Verification of the Second Video
A second video, shared widely on Facebook (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) and YouTube (1, 2, 3), was also claimed to show the recent Tibetan earthquake. For instance, a Facebook page named “Kashmir Times” livestreamed the 22-second clip, claiming it showed the destruction in Tibet’s Dingri County. The video garnered over 120,000 views and was shared nearly 2,000 times, with descriptions reporting 53 deaths and 62 injuries in a 6.8 magnitude earthquake.
To determine whether the video was from Tibet’s Dingri region, Dismislab conducted a reverse image search using keyframes, similar to the previous video verification process. Reports from The Japan News and The Mainichi contained footage identical to the viral video. Specifically, a 19- to 41-second segment from The Mainichi’s video was cut and circulated with false claims about Tibet. The Japanese articles explicitly stated that the footage was from the Noto Peninsula earthquake in Japan.
That is, an earthquake scene from a year ago in another country is being falsely portrayed as the recent disaster in Tibet. Both viral videos, which are actually from Japan’s 2024 earthquake, are being misrepresented as footage from Tibet.
Notably, on January 7, 2025, a 7.1-magnitude earthquake struck near the city of Shigatse in Tibet, as reported by the United States Geological Survey (USGS). The disaster damaged over 1,000 buildings and claimed at least 126 lives, according to Chinese state media.
However, this is not the first instance of misinformation during such events. In the past, old or unrelated footage has frequently been used to spread false claims during natural disasters. Dismislab has published multiple fact-check reports (1, 2, 3) on similar cases of misinformation involving earthquakes.
