![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/major-japanese-tv-network-tbs-853343896.jpg\")
\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/major-japanese-tv-network-tbs-853343967.jpg\")
<\/p>\nVLADIMIR Putin does use body doubles, a Japanese AI analysis has claimed. <\/p>\n
Research based on facial recognition,\u00a0voice comparison, and body movements indicates there are several different Vlads.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n<\/p>\n
It is even suggested that he may have been deploying doppelgangers for many years that have been ageing with the 71-year-old president.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The AI breakthrough comes just after the Kremlin dictator completed his high-profile trip to China, seeking to lead an alliance against the West.<\/p>\n
Claims of Putin using stand-ins or body doubles are not new and have been previously denied by the Kremlin.<\/p>\n
But a report for major Japanese TV network TBS understands that at least two Putin doubles have been seen at different events.<\/p>\n
The network claims the real Putin hosted this year\u2019s annual Red Square Victory Day parade on May 9.<\/p>\n But sophisticated facial recognition technology found that the Putin who inspected the Crimean Bridge ten months ago was only a 53 per cent match with the Putin on Red Square.<\/p>\n \u201cExperts on face recognition would refer\u00a0to this as\u00a0 \u2018not matching\u2019 in most cases, which leads us to the assumption this can be a double,\u201d said the commentary.\u00a0<\/p>\n One more Vlad appearance – at the war front in occupied Mariupol in March – shows only a 40 per cent facial recognition likeness with the Putin seen on Red Square, says the analysis.\u00a0<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Another stunning finding is that there is only an 18 per cent facial recognition likeness between the Putin on the Crimean Bridge and the Putin in Mariupol.<\/p>\n \u201cAI facial recognition experts\u2019 analysis is clearly displaying the high probability of at least two body doubles,\u201d concluded the report.<\/p>\n The broadcast also conducted voice analysis at Japan\u2019s Institute of Audio Communication Laboratory, which works closely with police on\u00a0 criminal investigations.\u00a0<\/p>\n This analysis for voice biometrics concentrated on the word \u2018spasibo\u2019 – or \u2018thank you\u2019 – uttered by Vlad on different occasions.\u00a0<\/p>\n The Putin who addressed the Eurasian Economic Union Forum held in May – assumed to be the real dictator – was found to be different to three other Putin appearances.\u00a0<\/p>\n The TV analysis concluded that the president's voice was different at the forum to other Putin examples at different appearances.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cOther than the difference in pronouncing the sound \u2019s\u2019, there is a remarkable gap in pronouncing \u2018pa\u2019 and \u2018si consecutively,\u201d said the narrator.\u00a0<\/p>\n Graphs were shown of the voice analysis highlighting the differences in emphasis.\u00a0<\/p>\n Expert Mutsutoshi Muraoka said: \u201cThere is a difference in the recording conditions, as well as the utterance as it is, but still it is extremely rare to have such strong differences.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe have to say at this point that the possibility of these two\u00a0voices belonging to different people is high.\u201d<\/p>\n While the voices are superficially similar, the analysis graphs show them to be starkly different.\u00a0<\/p>\n This suggests that a double was used at the military support concert in February and the Mariupol visit in March, when the same doppelganger was deployed.\u00a0<\/p>\n This indicates that a double is used even in front of thousands of people – as at the concert.<\/p>\n The programme suggested this was \u201crisky\u201d – making him vulnerable to being spotted as a fake.\u00a0<\/p>\n Yet the programme suggested a double may have been used due to the risk of assassination associated with the war in Ukraine.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cPutin was speaking a few short sentences, the stadium being huge\u00a0and him standing on the stage seen from afar saying a few greetings," said Akiyoshi\u00a0Komaki from Asahi newspaper.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was\u00a0rather easy to use a body double if so.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhat surprised me more was his\u00a0appearance at the helicopter plant and talking there for 30 some minutes."<\/p>\n And the same double appeared was used at the helicopter plant in Siberia in March.<\/p>\n \u201cThe body double did the 30 minute speech there alone, truly remarkable of him being outstanding person for a double,\u201d viewers of TBS NEWS DIG were told.\u00a0<\/p>\n At the time there was speculation that another Putin double was seen waving his hands around and repeatedly touching his nose – traits not especially common with the dictator.\u00a0<\/p>\n A former KGB spy colleague Sergei Zhirnov said at the time that he believed this was a doppelganger not scared to get close to people in the way Putin had been.\u00a0<\/p>\n Body movement analysis using the latest AI techniques also leads to the conclusion that Putin uses doubles, the Japanese analysis suggested.\u00a0<\/p>\n Analysis was made of previous Putin meetings with Chinese leader Xi Jinping and his talks with Belarus leader Alexander Lukashenko – when there was a 94 per cent match of these being the same Vlad.<\/p>\n "We see Putin himself walking with Xi Jinping, and him walking during the Naval Parade in St.Petersburg in July last year.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe used the newest AI to compare two walking videos, and it matched at 86 per cent," analysts said.<\/p>\n The walking is \u201csimilar\u201d\u00a0but Asilla company executive Masahiro Wakasa said: \u201cThere is a possibility of a body double.\u00a0<\/p>\n The comparison \u201ccouldn\u2019t reach the perfect matching and go above 90 per cent, and you cannot imitate something easily to go over 90 per cent.\u201d<\/p>\n The narrator said: \u201cThe Putin who appeared at the Main Naval Parade had 86 per cent matching.<\/p>\n \u201cIt surely looks high enough, but for the AI system being used, these numbers show the possibility of a different person.\u201d<\/p>\n And at Mariupol, the Putin walk only showed a 75 per cent match compared to the walk with Xi, indicating this was not the same person.<\/p>\n \u201cThe judgement was made by looking at the body posture during the walking,\u201d said Masahiro Wakasa in the broadcast, originally shown to Japanese viewers in June.\u00a0<\/p>\n The real Putin is seen as \u201cfalling forwards\u201d as he walks while the gait of the double is to keep a more upright posture.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIf we compare the two videos with assumed body doubles, the matching percentage drops to 69 per cent, being low, indicating two different people."<\/p>\n The investigation concluded: \u201cSumming up, there is a body double, and there is a high possibility of another separate body double.\u201d<\/p>\n The Mariupol appearance led to stories at the time that this was a double.\u00a0<\/p>\n Ukrainian sources argued that this was a fake Putin seen driving around the war-blitzed city.\u00a0<\/p>\n Shinji Hyodo, research secretary for the National Institute for Defence Studies, said: \u201cI personally found it interesting that a lot of people were saying that the person visiting Mariupol was not Putin himself.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cAnd here we see the scientific analysis proving the point.\u201d<\/p>\n The programme queried why body doubles are now used extensively, leading to them being exposed.<\/p>\n One explanation could be that the real Putin is sick.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI think that\u00a0these body doubles haven\u2019t started being doubles just recently," said foreign affairs expert Tsutsumi Shinsuke.<\/p>\n \u201cMaybe they have started from the very time Putin came into power, and he was continuously using body doubles, guiding and teaching them from back then.\u201d<\/p>\n The doubles can be spotted by AI yet they give impressive appearances speaking in detail exactly espousing Putin\u2019s views.<\/p>\n Shinsuke said this could be \u201cthe possible result of the long process of training".<\/p>\n Dr Solovey this week claimed that the double undertook Putin\u2019s visit to China this week, and that Xi Jinping\u00a0was\u00a0fully aware that he\u00a0met\u00a0a doppelganger.<\/p>\n \u201cThe fact is that the current President Vladimir Putin is living out the last days of his earthly life,\u201d said Solovey.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cNot months, and not weeks, but precisely the last days [due to terminal illness].<\/p>\n \u201cHe is currently, like in previous months, being successfully replaced by his double\u2026<\/p>\n \u201c[The double] even goes to Beijing.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd the Chinese side knows very well who they are dealing with.\u201d<\/p>\n Solovey claimed that Putin\u2019s leading security adviser and war hawk Nikolai Patrushev, 72, holds the \u201ctrump cards\u201d as head of a \u201clarge coalition\u201d in the race for the succession.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cHowever, this does not mean that the victory of Patrushev\u2019s coalition is predetermined.\u201d<\/p>\n One\u00a0theory is that the double could remain in power even after Putin dies.\u00a0<\/p>\n The Chinese went along with pantomime in the hope that the doppelganger\u2019s role would facilitate the existing security elite around Putin securing the succession, it was claimed.\u00a0<\/p>\n On Thursday, Ukrainian channels seized on an image of Putin speaking behind a flower bedecked lectern in Beijing.<\/p>\n![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/newspress-collage-24432818-1697559105321.jpg\")
<\/picture>VLAD TO SEE YOU <\/span><\/p>\nTelltale signs \u2018shaky\u2019 Putin is hiding health issues as he sucks up to Xi<\/h3>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/newspress-collage-24389182-1697183712934.jpg\")
<\/picture>POISON PLOT <\/span><\/p>\nRussian journalist who protested Vlad\u2019s war on TV feared POISONED after illness<\/h3>\n
Most read in The Sun<\/h2>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/NINTCHDBPICT000853217657.jpg\")
<\/picture>BABY SHOCK <\/span><\/p>\nGirl, 10, who fell pregnant after ‘rape by 14-yr-old\u2019 is ordered to get abortion<\/h3>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/newspress-collage-24446385-1697651863286.jpg\")
<\/picture>WIFE STRIFE <\/span><\/p>\nJames Haskell spotted without wedding ring – as wife Chloe takes hers off<\/h3>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/mike-skinner-british-rapper-musician-851378323.jpg\")
<\/picture>candid <\/span><\/p>\nI was one of the UK’s biggest music stars – but I lost thousands ‘betting’<\/h3>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/newspress-collage-24446224-1697643187999.jpg\")
<\/picture>mixing it up <\/span><\/p>\nLeigh-Anne Pinnock hints husband Andre Gray CHEATED with cryptic comment<\/h3>\n
Read More on The Sun<\/h2>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/picture-showing-christmas-ham-served-701517079-1.jpg\")
<\/picture>![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/RB-COMP-BB7-2.jpg\")
<\/picture>![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/major-japanese-tv-network-tbs-853343877.jpg\")
![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/major-japanese-tv-network-tbs-853343897.jpg\")
![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/major-japanese-tv-network-tbs-853343878.jpg\")
![](\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/russian-president-vladimir-putin-attend-853299763.jpg\")