A video allegedly showing close associates of President Nikos Christodoulides guiding people posing as foreign businesspeople on how to bypass campaign financing laws shows no obvious signs of artificial intelligence manipulation, though questions about editing and the creator’s identity remain unanswered, according to Fact Check Cyprus.
The video, published on 8 January on X, features Charalambos Charalambous, director of the president’s office, former Energy Minister Giorgos Lakkotrypis and Cyfield Group CEO George Chrysochos. The footage shows Chrysochos talking of his close relationship with the president.
An Audit Office report in October revealed that three major construction firms secured 40.8% of Cyprus’s public works contracts worth €2.5 billion between 2015 and 2024. Cyfield took on 157 projects worth €563.96 million during the period, ranking first in market share distribution for four consecutive years from 2019 to 2023.
The video has raised questions about the funding of Christodoulides’ 2023 presidential election campaign.
According to Fact Check Cyprus, the footage and excerpts were checked using AI detection tools Hive Moderation and InVID-WeVerify. The checks found no clear or convincing evidence of artificial creation or deepfake technology, particularly in sections where the faces of those recorded appear.
However, Fact Check Cyprus concluded that the production context, possible editing and exact identity of the creators cannot be determined with certainty. It remains unclear whether the video has been edited or presented out of context, or whether excerpts have been selectively chosen. The lack of access to complete audiovisual material and exact recording conditions prevents full assessment of the coherence of the conversations or the context in which they took place, Fact Check Cyprus said.
The government dismissed the video as malicious and edited. Government spokesman Konstantinos Letymbiotis said on Thursday the video “attempts to damage the image of the government and country through false, misleading claims and arbitrary conclusions,” and that authorities are investigating a case of a hybrid attack against the Republic of Cyprus following an assessment by the competent state service.
Both Lakkotrypis and Chrysochos, who appear in the footage, disputed the video’s authenticity. Lakkotrypis filed a complaint with Nicosia’s Criminal Investigation Department on Thursday, saying in a written statement that the video emerged from a fake profile and was edited to distort the context of his discussions with purported investors. Chrysochos also argued the video was edited and his statements taken out of context.
The video was presented as a leak and published by an X account called “Emily Thompson”, which describes itself as an “independent analyst.” The account has been active since 2022 and claims to be based in the United Kingdom, though no publicly verifiable information confirms the real identity behind it. A reverse search of the video by Fact Check Cyprus yielded no results.
Online research by Fact Check Cyprus found profiles with the same name on eurasiareview.com, thethinkingconservative.com and spectator.org, also presented as an “independent analyst,” though it cannot be confirmed these belong to the same person.
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