Metadata issue.

Hello apple uses. I have a question about metadata. Can creation date of metadata be changed? And if so can it be changed my user and or automatically by apple product transfer/save/airdrop.

The sensanrio is this. I lost some items. and had to submit photos to my insurance company. I didn't have pictures of my items by them selfs. So a friend of mine had pictures of said item. from when I had them. I asked him to send me over the pictures. So what he did was he went to his phone (iPhone) text me the pictures I then saved the pictures On my iPhone. Then airdrop them to my laptop and then uploaded them to my insurance companies site. Now they tell the date on the meta data states that I had items after I claimed they were gone due to the metadata of the pictures. .I said No kidding. the data will show creation date of the day I saved to my phone. He tells me thats no possible. I said when you turn off everything in your phone its possible that it will do that. And that also. if I were to sign into iCloud.com go to photos.and select a photo then go to the download icon on iCloud it sends it str8 to preview. Then I look at its info .. and guess what pops up. the date of which I downloaded it from iCloud as the creation date. But still keeps the device that it was taken on. So this metadata can be changed automatically from product to product? correct?