Claim:
In October 2025, social media posts said scientists discovered tiny robotic "spiders" from the interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS embedded in polar ice and transmitting data back to space.
Verdict: False
Why this is false
Independent checks found no corroborating reporting, scientific publications, or institutional announcements to support the posts. Searches for "robot spiders 3I/ATLAS" on Google, DuckDuckGo, Bing and Yahoo returned only the social posts making the claim, not mainstream news coverage or peer-reviewed research.
Timeline and orbital data don’t match
The posts claimed the spiders detached from 3I/ATLAS during its closest pass to Earth. According to the European Space Agency, 3I/ATLAS will not reach its nearest point to Earth until Dec. 19, 2025. NASA trajectory visualizations also show the Sun lay between Earth and 3I/ATLAS for much of the period after discovery, making the alleged continuous data transmission back to space implausible.
The image appears manipulated or AI‑generated
The photograph used with the posts contains several visual inconsistencies: the sky shows auroral features typical of the Northern Lights (which are not visible from Antarctica), the inset "spider" does not match the larger figures, and the creatures display inconsistent numbers of legs. These contradictions strongly suggest the image was altered or generated with artificial intelligence.
Source credibility
The Facebook page that circulated the story, Space Lane, has a documented pattern of posting fabricated accounts of extraterrestrial contact and discoveries; many of its prior items referenced 3I/ATLAS as well. Snopes has previously debunked other viral claims about 3I/ATLAS, including assertions it was an alien spacecraft.
Bottom line: There is no credible evidence that robotic "alien spiders" from comet 3I/ATLAS were found on polar ice. The claim is unsupported by independent sources, contradicts orbital data, and relies on a likely fabricated image.
Selected sources
- European Space Agency — Comet 3I/ATLAS Q&A (accessed Oct. 29, 2025)
- NASA Science — Comet 3I/ATLAS briefing (accessed Oct. 29, 2025)
- Snopes fact-check and social searches (Oct. 2025)
