AI ‘sky stadium’ video for Saudi 2034 World Cup fools social media

An AI-generated video claiming to show one of the football stadiums for the 2034 FIFA World Cup in Saudi Arabia made waves on social media this week -- but it has nothing to do with the kingdom's official plans. The video of glowing arena built atop a towering skyscraper was shared by thousands of social media accounts, with millions of users believing it was the official visual revealed by Saudi Arabia. While Riyadh has unveiled plans to build a football area on top of a real estate complex in The Line -– a futuristic new megacity project -– the official plans bear no resemblance to the clip that went viral in recent days. "This design is completely fake and bears no resemblance to anything Saudi Arabia is planning. It appears in no official sources," a source close to the matter told AFP. Several French media outlets, which had referred to the viral video as a representation of the kingdom's official project, have since deleted or updated their articles.

AFP's digital investigation team traced the video to the Instagram account "hyporaultraworks", which regularly posts AI-generated content of futuristic stadiums. The video was described as "an aerial flyby of a skyscraper stadium design" in the caption. The account holder told AFP on Friday that they were the original creator of the viral clip. "What started as a simple AI concept has taken on a life of its own -- over 50 million views later, our 'Sky Stadium' design has gone global (and slightly off the rails)," the user also wrote on their Facebook page. "I had no idea about any Saudi project when I made this," they said, adding it was "purely an imaginative AI concept, exploring what a vertical, skyscraper-style football stadium could look like."