Is it Real or AI-Generated? How Parents and Teens Can Check Content Together

How good are you at determining if what you’re looking at is real or generated by AI — artificial intelligence? When people first started using AI to create content, including photos, videos, and documents, there were plenty of obvious mistakes to spot. But AI generators like ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, and others are working every day to recognize and fix their mistakes. As a result, many common early mistakes AI generators made have decreased. 

That’s making it harder than ever for people to figure out what’s trustworthy or not. Just about anyone can fall for AI fakes. Sometimes that leaves people, young and old, feeling frustrated, embarrassed, or victimized when they believe what they see. But people with bad intentions may create and use AI content. They may want to engage and enrage you for profit. Or they want to change your opinion about someone or something you believe in. They may want to heat up the political climate, turn people against each other, or build a toxic environment of “us versus the others.” The bottom line is you don’t want to be fooled into thinking someone said or did something when they didn’t. 

And while AI generators have gotten better, parents and teens can still train themselves to become AI “detectives.” Knowing what to look for and the right questions to ask will help to determine what is accurate. If you’re concerned a family member may fall for fakes, consider conversation starters to help them get on track without making them feel out of touch. 

Start with the source

If the content makes you scratch your head or triggers an emotional reaction, stop and ask a few questions. Consider, “What source did this come from?” “Are they trustworthy?” and “What does the creator of this content stand to gain from me reacting to it?” Check whether a credible organization, journalist, agency, or individual published the content. Look for independent reporting from several reliable sources. Try to find the earliest available version of the content or the original post where it appeared. If the claims seem “urgent” or extraordinary, try to verify them through a trusted, official website. Parents and teens can also work together to try a reverse image search to determine where it originated. 

Check for visual inconsistencies or physical “oddities”

 Start by closely examining the small details. Are there things that don’t look quite right? You may see physical inconsistencies like extra limbs or limbs at odd angles. Text may look garbled, made up, or illegible even as other fonts, colors, and logos on objects look correct. The perspective in a photo may be problematic. Do lines on the floor go in the wrong direction or cut off unevenly? Does a tile floor grid look uneven or unfinished? 

AI still struggles to understand the full meaning or definition of text. It may create a version that looks good at first glance but makes no sense on closer inspection. Try zooming in on a photo or video frame to see if there is any shadowy effect around characters or logos, any blurring or haziness along lines, or if smaller text still looks like gibberish. 

Sometimes AI doesn’t fully grasp the relationship between two objects, and it may break physical rules. For example, are objects that are meant to be physically connected left “hovering” or floating when they shouldn’t be? (Like a key in a lock.) In the case of AI “food slop”, pictures often used to advertise food dishes on posters, signs, and menus, generators may mistakenly pick up patterns, like poppy seeds on a bagel, and replicate them throughout the picture. Even in areas where there should be none. 

Want to get the conversation started? Say, “Someone sent me this photo/image/video/document, and I had to look at it several times before I realized it was AI. Has that happened to you?” or “It feels like it’s getting harder to spot what’s real or what’s AI when it shows up in my feed. Do you ever feel like that?” 

Consider the context

Does what you’re looking at make sense in the first place? What are the chances that an elephant was caught on video standing in the ocean, seemingly communicating with a dolphin swimming nearby? Or that Taylor Swift appeared in ads on Instagram and TikTok offering fans Le Creuset Cookware? (She didn’t. Cybercriminals created a “celeb-bait” scam by gathering responders’ personal data and stealing shipping fees.) Fakes like these matter because, as in this case, Taylor Swift has millions of followers who may become victims of a scam after seeing her promote a product. If an AI fake makes her seem like she is trying to scam her fans or suggesting they should believe something hateful or divisive, it can do real harm. 

Instead of making each other feel ashamed or defensive by pointing out, “You fell for a fake,” ask, “Does it seem like the images throughout this video/photo make sense with everything we can also see there?” Even if it’s unclear whether it’s right or not, allow that starting question to guide you both towards discovering more. 

Check the markings

Many sources now mark AI-made videos. But others try to block or screen out those markings. So, look for small watermarks on the screen. Do they belong to the AI generator that made the video? Is there a mark or area that looks like it’s been blurred out so you can’t see what’s underneath?  Check for the date, location, caption, and surrounding context. 

Sometimes AI generators get one thing right but miss something else. So, don’t stop with just one discovery. For now, take time to train your brain and eyes to spot what to look for. 

Let Your Child Or Teen Be the Expert 

We have a lot to teach our children about life, but they often are way ahead of us in understanding technology. Many of our children have gotten used to being our tech teachers. Take advantage of this – make discovering AI a game. Ask them to find fakes online and show them to you to teach you about what you need to know. Say, “Teach me more about what you know. Go find me some examples and show me why and how they are fake.”  They find the mistakes; you bring home the lesson about values and wisely interpreting information. 

Good communication between adults and teens can help everyone stay vigilant, notice when things aren’t as they seem, and discuss why this matters.