Deepfake Patrol: free game to spot fake photos, voices and videos

What is Deepfake Patrol?

Four chapters with the gang, twelve posts: photos in the group chat, voice notes that sound like people you know, breaking videos and polished fakes with no glitches at all. Run a few checks on each post, from hands and lip-sync to who posted it and a reverse search, then call it real or fake.

Deepfake Patrol is a free media literacy game with Zip, Skip, Thumby and Buffer. Over four short chapters, twelve made-up posts land in front of the gang: a shark in a mall fountain, a voice note from "Mum" asking for money, a mayor cancelling school on video, a lost painting found in an attic. Each one is a described mock-up, never a real person.

For every post you can run only a few checks. Look checks examine the media itself: hands and faces, light and shadows, text on signs, lip-sync, breathing in a voice. Trace checks look at where it came from: who posted it, a reverse search for older copies, the file details, or calling the person back. Then call it Real or Fake, and see every check explained. The fakes get better each chapter, until the last ones have no visible tells at all.

At a glance

Category

Adventure

Difficulty

Medium

Play time

4–6 min

Price

Free, in your browser, sign-up optional

How to play

Read the post

Who shared it, the caption, and a description of the photo, voice note or video.

Run checks

3 per post in chapter 1, then 2. Look checks examine the media (hands, light, text, lip-sync, voice). Trace checks examine where it came from (who posted it, reverse search, file details, calling back).

Call it

Real or Fake. A real clip with a false story counts as fake. Every check is revealed and explained after your call.

Score

100 for the right call, +50 if one of your checks showed the proof. A wrong call costs a life: 3 lives.

Scoring

Each of the 12 posts scores 100 for the right call (Real or Fake), plus 50 if one of the checks you ran showed the proof. A perfect run scores 1,800.

A wrong call costs one of 3 lives. You get 3 checks per post in chapter 1, then 2, so pick them well: in the last chapter only the source checks catch the fakes.

What it trains

Spotting tells

Extra fingers, garbled text, shadows going two ways, lips out of sync, voices with no breath.

Checking the source

Who posted it first, what the official channel says, and calling a person back on a number you already have.

Doubting both ways

Finding old clips with new stories, and not calling a strange but real photo fake.

Strategy and tips

Count the fingers, read the signs

Extra fingers, garbled letters and shadows going two ways are classic tells of a generated picture.

Listen for breathing

Cloned voices often run sentences together with no breath and a flat tone. But a natural sound proves nothing.

Trace beats look

Who posted it first, and does the official source agree? That check still works when the fake is perfect.

Old video, new story

A real clip with a false caption is still fake news. A reverse search finds where it really came from.

Strange isn't fake

A weird purple sky can be real. Calling real things fake hurts trust too, so look for proof both ways.

Why play Deepfake Patrol?

Generated photos, cloned voices and deepfake videos keep getting better, and the visual tells people learned a few years ago are fading. Deepfake Patrol trains both habits: noticing the tells that still appear, and, above all, checking the source, calling back and searching for older copies before you share or act.

Frequently asked questions