A vintage-style photo of Pauline Hanson serving adoring customers in a busy fish and chip shop in the late 1980s is being widely shared on social media.

The One Nation leader did run a fish and chip shop in Ipswich before she was first elected to parliament in 1996 – but the image circulating is an AI-generated fake.

It is being shared alongside a sentimentalised retelling of Hanson’s life before politics.

“In 1987 Pauline Hanson was divorced and alone with three children, when she borrowed money to buy Marsden’s Seafood in Ipswich, a rundown takeaway shop,” a September 17 Facebook post reads.

“She turned the business around. For eight years she worked 80 to 90 hours a week, six days a week largely by herself, to support her children and avoid going on benefits.

“Pauline had no parents or other family support, making it ‘extremely hard’ Just one of the many reasons we love her.”

The image in the post purports to show Hanson smiling behind the shop counter as she hands food to a customer.

The shop is adorned with an Australian flag hanging from the ceiling and a sign next to it that reads: “GOOD FOOD, GOOD MATES, GREAT AUSSIES”.

However, a few visual clues suggest the image was created using AI software.

The Australian flag in the image has seven stars, instead of the usual six.

In the foreground, a plate of uncooked fish appears to be merged with the glass front of the hot food counter.

Additionally, Hanson’s fish and chip shop was called Marsden’s Seafood, according to a 2015 article in The Queensland Times, but a sign behind the counter in the AI-generated image erroneously reads “SILKSTONE FISH & CHIPS”.

AI-generated image: Hanson’s actual shop wasn’t called Silkstone. Photo: Facebook

The style and wording of the shop signage in the AI-generated image do not match a genuine image of Hanson’s shop from 1998, published in a 2016 Courier Mail article.

Silkstone is the suburb where the fish and chip shop formerly owned by Hanson is located, according to The Queensland Times article.

Hanson owned Marsden’s Seafood from 1987 to 1997 “after 10 years of hard work 90 hours a week providing for myself and my family”, the article quotes the senator as saying.

OpenAI’s verification tool also reveals the image contains an invisible digital watermark, known as SynthID, that confirms it was generated using OpenAI software.

­–AAP

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