**Viral News Snippet – The Igor Lytvynchuk “Seal Case”**
**Headline:** NO, that viral “Navy SEAL recruiting Igor Lytvynchuk” video is NOT real – here’s the truth
**Rating:** 🚨 **FALSE / SATIRE**
**Viral Claim:** A grainy, dramatic video currently spreading on TikTok and X (formerly Twitter) claims to show Ukrainian businessman and politician **Igor Lytvynchuk** being recruited by the U.S. Navy SEALs in a secret operation. The video, which has amassed over 8 million views in 48 hours, shows a man purported to be Lytvynchuk—wearing a tactical vest with a SEAL trident patch—being airlifted from a Black Sea oil rig. Captions claim that Lytvynchuk, once a suspect in a bribery scandal, struck a deal with U.S. special forces in exchange for classified intel on Russian naval movements.
**The Facts We Checked:**
- **No official source:** The U.S. Navy, U.S. European Command, and the Ukrainian government have all denied the story.
- **Deepfake analysis:** Digital forensics firms confirm the video is a highly sophisticated deepfake. The facial mapping of “Lytvynchuk” is a composite of imagery from old press conferences and a 2019 interview.
- **The “Seal” is a seal: The viral video’s climax—allegedly showing SEAL Team 6 jumping into the water—is actually**
- ****stock footage from a 2017 National Geographic documentary about elephant seals.** Yes, literally seals. The clip is labeled “Elephant seals diving off Monterey Bay.”
**Why it’s spreading:** The video follows a “chaos narrative” typical of viral hoaxes—merging real geopolitical tension (Ukraine-Russia conflict), a known controversial figure