They’ve used this exact image for APOD 3 times now. 2010, 2014 and now 2020. They seem to recycle a lot of images through APOD.
Yup, and that's not confined to just this one image. Not sure how they pick the images, but it would seem as if it's not that hard to verify whether it's been used before. I guess it's close enough for gubmint work.