Fact-Check: Old Image of iPhone falsley linked to Lebanon Pager explosions. Here are the facts

An image is being widely shared on social media X (formely Twitter) claiming it is an iPhone blast from Lebanon. While sharing this image, users are tweeting: “You don’t have to be in Lebanon for the Israelis to blow up your iPhone: you could be in a British Airways plane or a school: think about it apple.

Moreover, several users have shared the image with similar claims. The link can be seen here, here, and here.

Fact-check

To determine the reality of the above viral image, the DFRAC team reverse-searched it on Google. we found a report by the Arabic news outlet cairo24 dated Mar 19, 2021, carrying the same image. The report stated that this incident had taken place in Maadi, Egypt.

As per report,the child’s father, a businessman named “Ahmed Okasha”, put his iPhone in the electrical socket to charge it, & suddenly the phone exploded causing fire in the table and the bed pillow & almost reaching the sleeping child. Still, he woke up and tried to escape, so he fell to the ground and broke his arm. The father arrived and was able to put out the fire, and the child was taken for treatment. The child’s father filed a report with the police station

Conclusion

It is evident from DFRAC’s fact-check that the viral image of the iPhone blast dates back to 2021 & is from Egypt’s Maadi, not from Lebanon. Hence, the claim made by users is misleading.