However, there is no reliable data that such lessons actually took place in Lithuanian schools. The photos circulated online do not allow identification of the specific school, date, or context, and they are mostly spread by pro-Russian “Telegram” channels known for disinformation content.
Exploited a high-profile event
The falsehood began to spread on May 21 – at that time, an unidentified drone that flew into the country’s territory the day before was actively discussed in Lithuania.
On the morning of May 20, an air threat was declared for about half an hour in Vilnius County due to a drone spotted in the sky near the Lithuania-Belarus border. Authorities urged Vilnius residents to descend into shelters.
Schools led children to shelters and basements, some Vilnius residents left their workplaces and went underground, and air and rail traffic in the capital was suspended for a while.
President Gitanas Nausėda and Prime Minister Inga Ruginienė, along with other top state officials, were evacuated to bunkers. The incident received wide coverage in foreign media – it was emphasized that this was the first such air threat warning in an EU and NATO country since the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
According to reports, the incursions of Ukrainian drones into Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania may have been caused by electronic jamming conducted by Russia.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen stated after the incident that Russia and Belarus are directly responsible for the recent increase in drone incursions into the airspace of EU and NATO countries.
“Public Russian threats to the Baltic states are completely unacceptable,” U. von der Leyen posted on the social network X.
Trying to blame Ukrainians
On the day of the air threat, photos appeared online showing Vilnius residents descending into special shelters. Some of the photos were taken in schools.
Soon, alongside these images, alleged photos from a school shelter began to be circulated, showing students supposedly watching a presentation during the air threat signal.
It is claimed that Lithuanian students were shown a presentation in shelters about a Ukrainian drone that flew into the country. It allegedly explained: “This is a good drone, it does not want to harm us. It got lost and accidentally came to us.” One or two photos are usually circulated as supposed proof of such a “lesson.”
The authors of the circulated messages aim to create the impression that Lithuania is allegedly trying to “normalize” military incidents and foster children’s favorability towards Ukraine.
This kind of rhetoric corresponds to a common Kremlin propaganda narrative portraying the Baltic states as uncritically obedient to Ukraine or NATO.
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AI images
However, the traces of the viral photos lead not to Lithuanian information sources or media, but to pro-Russian “Telegram” channels, which have previously been linked to disinformation dissemination. The earliest posts with these photos appeared on the afternoon of May 21 – more than a day after the air threat was declared in Vilnius.
Later, the same images began to be widely spread on other “Telegram” channels, the “X” platform, and various pro-Russian blogs.
The messages claim that the photos show an evacuation at one of Vilnius’s schools, where children were allegedly shown a presentation about a “lost” Ukrainian drone during the air threat. However, the “evidence” presented raises many questions.
Although different presentation slides are visible in the photos, most children’s postures, gaze directions, and even hand positions hardly change, as if both shots were taken at the same moment.
In real videos or photos taken at different times, people’s body positions usually change at least minimally – especially in a group of children. Therefore, such unusual stillness may indicate that the image was generated or artificially edited.
The photos were checked using OpenAI’s artificial intelligence generated image detection tool, which detected an invisible “SynthID” watermark in both images.
This is a special digital marker embedded in the image using AI systems. It is invisible to the human eye but allows identification that the image was generated or at least significantly edited using AI tools.
Detection of such a mark is not an absolute proof that the entire photo was completely created from scratch. However, it is an important indicator that the image is not an authentic, unprocessed photograph.
In other words, it means that the image was digitally manipulated – and such images are often used in disinformation campaigns to create alleged “evidence” to support emotional or politically sensitive stories.
15min verdict: falsehood. Claims circulated on social networks that Lithuanian schools showed children a presentation about a “good” Ukrainian drone in shelters do not correspond to reality. There is no reliable data that such lessons took place, and the alleged “evidence” – photos – first appeared on pro-Russian channels and show possible signs of AI generation or editing.
Publication prepared by 15min in cooperation with Meta, aiming to stop the spread of misleading news on social networks. More about the program and its rules – here.
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