Found a Newsday article via Blogdex reporting that an alleged photo of John Kerry standing next to Jane Fonda at a 1971 anti-war rally was faked.
As a 20-year-old photographer documenting the country's struggle over the Vietnam War, Ken Light snapped the picture of John Kerry at a peace rally in Mineola. It captured the future senator alone at a podium, squinting into the sun.
Light did not photograph Jane Fonda on that warm June Sunday in 1971. The actress, who is reviled by many Vietnam veterans for her vocal stance against the war, did not even attend.
But when opponents of the Democratic presidential hopeful began e-mailing Light's picture to one another four days ago, it depicted Fonda standing by Kerry's side. The photo had been doctored.
"I'm horrified," said Light, 52, who grew up in East Meadow and now heads the graduate photojournalism program at the University of California at Berkeley. "I think this kind of alteration is probably one of the scariest forms of trickery, particularly when it's done against a political candidate."
This is really scary. We've reached the point where the basis of historical record can't be trusted. If only experts can tell whether a photo has been doctored, how will the rest of us know what is real?
So the question is: is there a system that could easily verify that an image has not been tampered with? Maybe a watermark in the file or a digital signature. Does such a feature exist? How would it work? Any ideas?
Posted by sarah at February 16, 2004 10:23 AM in News