Z Two police officers in heavy gear support a wounded colleague. A large wound gapes on his forehead, and the blood runs down his face through his short haircut. In the background one can vaguely make out a large crowd dressed in black, bottles lying on the ground.
That is what the cover image of a press release from January 25 by the Saxony Police Union looked like. Alongside it the headline: “Severe Rioting in Magdeburg – GdP Saxony Condemns Violence” regarding rioting at a football match. The image suggests: the police are victims of violence from these riots. The problem: the image is not real, but AI-generated. The police officers depicted do not exist, what is shown did not happen in this form.
It is undisputed that the police, especially during operations in stadiums, find themselves in situations like the one depicted. As with the football match between 1. FC Magdeburg and Dynamo Dresden. The Saxony Police Union speaks of “64 injured police officers,” some of whom were severely injured and ended up in hospital.
However, the question is why the release used an utterly false image with a barely noticeable note in the lower right corner reading “AI: ChatGPT” to portray the real situation on site. In the release itself there is no indication that an utterly false image was used.
“A Constant Editorial Directive”
Today, January 29, the misleading image was removed and replaced with the simple, unremarkable depiction of a police car’s blue light. The changes in the case of the blood-soaked officer regarding the stadium violence were part of “a constant editorial directive,” a spokesperson for the Police Union told on request. Real photos are not feasible due to privacy rights, investigations, and protecting those affected. The spokesperson adds that the change is not a “content reassessment,” but a “reduction of visualization.” Why they initially chose such a drastic image remains open.
Indeed, the drastic portrayal of the injured officer had sparked criticism after appearing in social networks and the media. But AI-generated images have been used for other police operations as well, such as by the Police Union Saxony-Anhalt in a press release dated January 24, 2026.
Narrative through Artificial Intelligence
It is easy to imagine generated images with clichéd depictions of left-wing protesters with a “hammer and sickle” patch on their jacket and dyed hair, in which they attack police officers. Thanks to artificial intelligence, any narrative can be created or deliberately distorted. A police union must be aware of the implications of such generated images.
It undermines the remaining credibility of the police when, in addition to accusations of massively excessive force, such as at the demonstrations in Giessen at the end of last year, they now also actively convey false impressions with AI images. The fact that police chat groups regularly contain nationalist and racist content and face few consequences further reveals the institution’s character. At least in the Magdeburg press release the following sentence is true: “Violence has no place in football.”
