An image shared on Facebook claims to show Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates wearing a dress as a child in 1963.

Verdict: False

The image was taken at a parade in Lviv, Ukraine, in 1968 and shows an unidentified child that does not closely resemble young Gates.

Fact Check:

Gates has often been the subject of baseless rumors circulating on social media. Now social media users are sharing a photo of a young child, allegedly Gates in 1963, wearing a light blue dress and glasses. (RELATED: Did Bill Gates Say, ‘Only The People Who Have All The Vaccines Will Still Be Able To Move Freely’?)

The photo, however, does not actually show Gates. Through a reverse image search, Check Your Fact found the image included in a December article from The Calvert Journal, a digital magazine that focuses on Eastern Europe, about a social media user who shares photos from the Soviet Union. The caption in the article states that it was taken at the “May 1st Parade, 1968. Lvov, Ukrainian SSR” and identifies the child as female.

The image was also shared on Facebook in 2019 by the Museum of the History of Photography in Lviv. A translation of the museum’s Facebook post notes that the photo “has nothing to do with any of the famous people” and that it was taken in Lviv in 1968.

Images of Gates, who grew up in Seattle, Washington, show him to have blonde hair and no glasses as a young child, while the child in the photo has dark hair and wears glasses. CNN Business in 2015 published an image of Gates taken around 1968, the year the photo in the Facebook post was taken, showing Gates at 13 years old.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation did not return a request for comment by the time of publication.