Hello, World - NASA

NASA astronaut and Artemis II Commander Reid Wiseman took this picture of Earth from the Orion spacecraft's window on April 2, 2026, after completing the translunar injection burn.

NASA
I was confused when I first saw this photo, as I don't think I've ever before seen a nightside, moonlit Earth, exposed so that it looks like the dayside at a first glance. I wonder how many casual viewers actually realize it's the night side. A nice demonstration of how moonlight is pretty much exactly like sunlight, just much much dimmer. In particular it has the same color, even though moonlight is often thought of as bluish and sunlight as yellowish!
It explains why the image is so grainy. At first I was confused what that stripe to the left and the bottom was. But it’s just the window edge, and the noise isn’t stars.
(To be clear, the bright dots are stars [except the brightest one, in the lower right, is Venus I think], which makes this photo also a great demonstration that of course you can capture stars in space, you just have to expose properly!)

How do you know that they're stars? I believe they probably are stars as well (by visual comparison with a star chart, suitably rotated), but I've found no source for either claim.

I did find multiple sources, including TFA, for the brightest being Venus.

They're much brighter than the noise floor. Photographic noise doesn't really have such outliers.
Why would you think they are not stars? Not really sure the confusion on the matter. Are we leaning towards this being shot from a soundstage?