#FactCheck -Viral Video of General Manoj Pande Misleading, Audio Found to Be AI-Generated
Executive Summary:
A video of former Army Chief General Manoj Pande is going viral on social media with the claim that he attacked the Modi government, saying that supporting Israel is causing significant harm to the Indian Army. The research by CyberPeace revealed that the audio present in the viral video is AI-generated. No such statement was made in the original video.
Claim:
On social media platform X, while sharing the viral video, users wrote, “Delhi: Former Army Chief General Manoj Pande (Retd.) said, ‘Do you know what the biggest loss of supporting Israel is? Our Indian Army was always trained as a moral force, but the current situation is turning it into an ethnic force. Remember my words, this situation is moving towards a complete rebellion. We have all seen what is happening in Assam.’ ‘The Israeli army stands against humanity, and brutality has become its identity. Our army is becoming like them due to its association. The Modi government and the Sangh Parivar are responsible for this. For both, Israel is an ideal country, and they are running an agenda to turn India into Israel.’”
Fact Check:
In the research of the viral video claiming that former Army Chief General Manoj Pande attacked the Modi government, we conducted a reverse image search with the help of keyframes. During this process, we found a video uploaded on March 14 on the X account of the news agency Press Trust of India (PTI).
The visuals present in the video matched those in the viral video.
In this video, former Army Chief General Manoj Pande was seen delivering a speech in Marathi and English. However, during this, he was talking about increasing new kinds of capabilities in view of the current situation and not mentioning Israel, as claimed in the viral video. In the approximately 1 minute 15 seconds long video, he did not give any such statement as present in the viral video.
While taking the research forward, we found a report published on March 15, 2026, on the website of ThePrint. This report mentioned the speech delivered by former Army Chief General Manoj Pande, but no report mentioned the statement shown in the viral video.
Conclusion:
Our research found that the audio present in the viral video is AI-generated. In the original video, he did not make any such statement.
Related Blogs
Executive Summary
A graphic featuring Union Home Minister Amit Shah is being widely shared on social media, claiming that he has announced a complete ban on alcohol in West Bengal from September 30. The post further suggests that the state will move towards becoming a dry state. Notably, this claim surfaced soon after the BJP’s victory in the West Bengal Assembly elections. CyberPeace Research Wing research has found the viral claim to be false. Our research confirms that Home Minister Amit Shah has not made any such announcement.
Claim:
On Instagram, a user shared a viral graphic on May 8, 2026, alleging that Amit Shah announced a complete ban on alcohol in West Bengal starting September 30. The post link and archived version are provided below:
- https://www.instagram.com/reel/DYDy13zINV5/
- https://archive.ph/mYpZS
Fact Check
To verify the claim, we conducted a keyword-based search on Google. However, we did not find any credible media reports supporting the viral claim. Since the graphic carried the logo of India Today, we also checked the official website, YouTube channel, and social media handles of India Today. However, no matching report or graphic was found.
In the final step, we reviewed the official X account of the Ministry of Home Affairs. Even there, no statement or report confirming the viral claim was found. The relevant link is provided below:
- https://x.com/HMOIndia
Conclusion:
Our research confirms that Home Minister Amit Shah has made no such announcement regarding a complete alcohol ban in West Bengal.
Executive Summary:
One of the most complex threats that have appeared in the space of network security is focused on the packet rate attacks that tend to challenge traditional approaches to DDoS threats’ involvement. In this year, the British based biggest Internet cloud provider of Europe, OVHcloud was attacked by a record and unprecedented DDoS attack reaching the rate of 840 million packets per second. Targets over 1 Tbps have been observed more regularly starting from 2023, and becoming nearly a daily occurrence in 2024. The maximum attack on May 25, 2024, got to 2.5 Tbps, this points to a direction to even larger and more complex attacks of up to 5 Tbps. Many of these attacks target critical equipment such as Mikrotik models within the core network environment; detection and subsequent containment of these threats prove a test for cloud security measures.
Modus Operandi of a Packet Rate Attack:
A type of cyberattack where an attacker sends with a large volume of packets in a short period of time aimed at a network device is known as packet rate attack, or packet flood attack or network flood attack under volumetric DDoS attack. As opposed to the deliberately narrow bandwidth attacks, these raids target the computation time linked with package processing.
Key technical characteristics include:
- Packet Size: Usually compact, and in many cases is less than 100 bytes
- Protocol: Named UDP, although it can also involve TCP SYN or other protocol flood attacks
- Rate: Exceeding 100 million packets per second (Mpps), with recent attacks exceeding 840 Mpps
- Source IP Diversity: Usually originating from a small number of sources and with a large number of requests per IP, which testifies about the usage of amplification principles
- Attack on the Network Stack : To understand the impact, let's examine how these attacks affect different layers of the network stack:
1. Layer 3 (Network Layer):
- Each packet requires routing table lookups and hence routers and L3 switches have the problem of high CPU usage.
- These mechanisms can often be saturated so that network communication will be negatively impacted by the attacker.
2. Layer 4 (Transport Layer):
- Other stateful devices (e.g. firewalls, load balancers) have problems with tables of connections
- TCP SYN floods can also utilize all connection slots so that no incoming genuine connection can be made.
3. Layer 7 (Application Layer):
- Web servers and application firewalls may be triggered to deliver a better response in a large number of requests
- Session management systems can become saturated, and hence, the performance of future iterations will be a little lower than expected in terms of their perceived quality by the end-user.
Technical Analysis of Attack Vectors
Recent studies have identified several key vectors exploited in high-volume packet rate attacks:
1.MikroTik RouterOS Exploitation:
- Vulnerability: CVE-2023-4967
- Impact: Allows remote attackers to generate massive packet floods
- Technical detail: Exploits a flaw in the FastTrack implementation
2.DNS Amplification:
- Amplification factor: Up to 54x
- Technique: Exploits open DNS resolvers to generate large responses to small queries
- Challenge: Difficult to distinguish from legitimate DNS traffic
3.NTP Reflection:
- Command: monlist
- Amplification factor: Up to 556.9x
- Mitigation: Requires NTP server updates and network-level filtering
Mitigation Strategies: A Technical Perspective
1. Combating packet rate attacks requires a multi-layered approach:
- Hardware-based Mitigation:
- Implementation: FPGA-based packet processing
- Advantage: Can handle millions of packets per second with minimal latency
- Challenge: High cost and specialized programming requirements
2.Anycast Network Distribution:
- Technique: Distributing traffic across multiple global nodes
- Benefit: Dilutes attack traffic, preventing single-point failures
- Consideration: Requires careful BGP routing configuration
3.Stateless Packet Filtering:
- Method: Applying filtering rules without maintaining connection state
- Advantage: Lower computational overhead compared to stateful inspection
- Trade-off: Less granular control over traffic
4.Machine Learning-based Detection:
- Approach: Using ML models to identify attack patterns in real-time
- Key metrics: Packet size distribution, inter-arrival times, protocol anomalies
- Challenge: Requires continuous model training to adapt to new attack patterns
Performance Metrics and Benchmarking
When evaluating DDoS mitigation solutions for packet rate attacks, consider these key performance indicators:
- Flows per second (fps) or packet per second (pps) capability
- Dispersion and the latency that comes with it is inherent to mitigation systems.
- The false positive rate in the case of the attack detection
- Exposure time before beginning of mitigation from the moment of attack
Way Forward
The packet rate attacks are constantly evolving where the credible defenses have not stayed the same. The next step entails extension to edge computing and 5G networks for distributing mitigation closer to the attack origins. Further, AI-based proactive tools of analysis for prediction of such threats will help to strengthen the protection of critical infrastructure against them in advance.
In order to stay one step ahead in this, it is necessary to constantly conduct research, advance new technologies, and work together with other cybersecurity professionals. There is always a need to develop secure defenses that safeguard these networks.
Reference:
https://blog.ovhcloud.com/the-rise-of-packet-rate-attacks-when-core-routers-turn-evil/
https://cybersecuritynews.com/record-breaking-ddos-attack-840-mpps/
https://www.cloudflare.com/learning/ddos/famous-ddos-attacks/
Introduction
It’s a proud moment for Indians that India will host the G- 20 administration, which will bring the world’s 20 largest profitable nations together on a single platform during the post-economic recovery and the Russia- Ukraine conflict, which has increased geopolitical pressures among nations over the last many times and made the G- 20 a precedence of nations. With this administration, India has to make cybersecurity precedence, as the security and integrity of the critical structure and digital platforms are top precedence in 2023. The necessity for a secure cyberspace is pivotal given the exponential increase in the volume and kind of cyber-attacks, particularly to crucial structures the most recent illustration is the ongoing interruption at New Delhi’s All India Institute of Medical lores caused by a ransomware assault. It has been observed that the mode of attacks are more sophisticated and targets communication structure, critical structure, transport systems, and especially the information technology sector and fiscal system.
The structure that enables the delivery of government services to be more effective. As a result,cyber-secured critical structures and digital public forums are necessary for public security, bettered governance, and, most importantly, maintaining people’s trust. The G20 can be enhanced and contribute towards securing digital public platforms and the integrity of the critical structure. This time, in 2023, digital security is the top precedence.
G20 cybersecurity enterprises and politic sweat
The emphasis on cybersecurity was maintained throughout the Italian and Indonesian regulations in 2021 and 2022, independently, by emphasizing the significance of cyberspace during Digital Economy Working Group addresses. Specifically, under the Indonesian Presidency, the prominent cybersecurity focus was clear in the recent Bali Leaders’ protestation, which noted, among other effects, the significance of fighting misinformation juggernauts and cyber attacks, as well as guaranteeing connectivity structure security. The cyber incident report by the Financial Stability Board on carrying further uniformity in cyber incident reporting In 2016, a G20 digital task force was created under the Chinese administration to understand digital technology issues. Under the Saudi administration, the cybersecurity gap at the G20 was bridged by addressing the issues of MSMs. India has also refocused on the significance of creating secure, secure, and stronger-friendly digital platforms.
G20- India’s digital invention alliance( G-20-DIA) a cyber-secure Bharat
- Under India’s administration, the G20’s Digital Economy Working Group is led by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology( MeitY, DEWG).
- The Ministry concentrated on three major areas during India’s G20 administration digital skill development, digital public structure, and cyber security.
- The EWG’s DIA and Stay Safe Online enterprise further the ideal of lesser digital metamorphosis by guaranteeing a safe and creative cyber terrain. They want to offer a smooth and secure delivery of public services.
The G20 Digital Innovation Alliance
(G20- DIA) strives to find, admit, and encourage the relinquishment of innovative and poignant digital technologies produced by invited G20 startups and-member governments.
- These technologies must meet humanity’s conditions in six crucial areas husbandry, health, education, finance, secure digital structure, and indirect frugality.
- The inventions created around these motifs will be supported by the Digital Public Goods structure, allowing them to be espoused encyclopedically, closing the digital gap and icing sustainable and indifferent growth.
- The G20 Digital Innovation Alliance( G20- DIA) conference will be held on the perimeters of the Digital Economy Working Group( DEWG) meeting in Bengaluru.
- Top-nominated entrepreneurs from each order will present their ideas to a worldwide community of investors, instructors, pots, and other stakeholders at this event.
India’s” Stay Safe Online crusade”
The” Stay Safe Online” crusade attempts to raise mindfulness about the significance of remaining safe in the online world amid our adding reliance on it. With the fast expansion of the technical terrain and the growing number of internet druggies in India, new difficulties are arising. The Stay Safe Online crusade aims to educate individuals about cyber pitfalls and how to avoid them. The time-long crusade will target children, women, scholars, and aged citizens, as well as individuals with disabilities, preceptors, and government officers in particular. It’ll be done in Hindi, English, and indigenous languages to reach a larger followership. It’ll distribute mindfulness information in infographics, short pictures, cartoon stories, and so on through extensively employed social media platforms and other channels. The primary stakeholders will be government agencies, civil societies, and NGOs.
Conclusion
To wind up, it can be said that cyber security has become the most essential part of transnational affairs. As India hosts the G20 administration in 2023, the docket relating to cybersecurity gains a global stage, where cyber-related issues are addressed and honored encyclopedically, and nations can combat these issues; also, India aims to raise cyber mindfulness among its citizens.
