WhatsApp is promising to introduce new features intended to prevent the spread of hoax messages in India following reports that more than one dozen lynchings have occurred in the country as a result of false rumors spread on the popular, Facebook-owned messaging service.
On Tuesday at tech festival SXSW, streaming site and Google subsidiary YouTube’s CEO Susan Wojcicki proposed one solution to the conspiracy screeds and “false flag” hoax videos that are slowly but surely taking over the site by gaming its algorithms.
These trolls, clearly trying to ruin everyone else’s fun, have claimed to be moviegoers who were assaulted at Black Panther showings for trying to see the movie while being white.
Sorry, folks. Spider-Man didn’t ride a horse, play with pandas, or take a nap next to the Great Wall. The posters for China’s release of Spider-Man: Homecoming are a hoax.
Have you seen that 1977 Time magazine cover proclaiming that you need to prepare for the coming Ice Age? It’s popular on right wing sites that claim climate change is a hoax. But the magazine cover itself is 100 percent fake. Good thing nobody printed it off and showed it to the president though, right?
Yesterday, Sean Spicer said that Hitler, “didn’t even sink to using chemical weapons.” It was completely wrong and he apologized. One version of Spicer’s apology was posted on Facebook, and it appears to be just as offensive as his original statement. The only problem? It’s totally fake.
Earlier tonight, the broadcast of The Daily Show was briefly interrupted by a blip of stock war footage, a spinning ballerina, and a web address with a Russian domain name. The internet quickly assumed that the late night comedy show had been hacked. It wasn’t.
Did you see that story about a 5-year-old boy and his dying wish to see Santa Claus? Of course you did. The heartbreaking tale has been seen and heard by millions of people around the world. It went viral earlier this week when it was retold by virtually every major news outlet. The only problem? It’s almost certainly…
Those working in tech owe much of their livelihood to Dennis Ritchie. The New-York born pioneer was among the early Bell Labs alums, and is credited with both creating the C programming language and co-developing Unix.
Every time a natural disaster hits, we see plenty of fake photos on social media. And with Hurricane Matthew currently hitting Florida, there are lots of fake images currently doing the rounds. The short version: If you see a photo of sharks in the streets, it’s probably fake.
Since Pokémon Go hit the app stores, people have been wondering what other fictional universes they could be fun in augmented reality. Of course, Harry Potter is one that keeps showing up.
Last week the internet watched in amazement as Leo Weston solved three Rubik’s cubes while juggling them. Now he’s back to show us how he faked the entire thing, and its just as impressive.
Salim PK, a police officer in Delhi, India, was captured on video while allegedly drunk on a metro train. Video of him staggering and falling over went viral. But doctors have confirmed what he insisted all along: He was actually having a stroke.
The internet went into a tizzy this week when headlines proclaimed that the Uber driver in Kalamazoo, Michigan who’s accused of murdering six people was suing Uber for $10 million. But the lawsuit is a hoax.
Did you see that video of a knife-wielding crab that went viral recently? Sadly, it’s a hoax. The Washington Post spoke with an expert, and the whole thing was definitely staged. The crab didn’t pick up the knife itself. In reality, the blade was almost certainly jammed into the crab’s claw, and the crab can’t let go.
The truth is out there. And by “out there” I mean anywhere but the internet. We see hundreds of images flash in front of our eyes every month. But these are the ones you might have seen recently that deserve a second look. Because they’re all fake.
When Marty McFly finally arrives in modern-day Hill Valley, California a little later this afternoon, I admit I’ll be a little sad. Because his arrival signifies the end of one of the best internet memes of all time.
When 14-year-old Ahmed Mohamed arrived at school on Monday morning with a digital clock he’d built from scratch, he was keen to show his teachers the fruit of his labors. Instead, he was pulled out of class and arrested for attempting to build a bomb.
You hear me? Ever.
David L. Stern is a freelance writer based in Kiev, Ukraine. He’s also, if you believe several Russian media outlets, a covert CIA agent who helped orchestrate a conspiracy to shoot down an airplane and blame Russia. What a busy fellow!
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