Coronavirus: scams and false news

Written by David Fletcher 02 Apr 2020
Coronavirus: scams and false news

We are all at risk from false information. For instance, a photo was circulated of a busy mosque supposedly in lockdown, but it was taken before lockdown. Another image showed trucks said to be carrying bodies of Covid-19 victims - but this was untrue, and the picture had been taken in Italy. We can pray that the waves of fear generated by similar scams are prevented by astute reporting and investigating. More serious than false news is fraudulent information and theft when members of the public are texted and told to share their bank card details in order to receive a supposed Covid-19 relief payment from the government. Similarly-worded emails have been sent from a website named ‘uk-covid-relieve.com.’ The true government’s website has a ‘gov.uk’ URL, not a ‘.com’. The authors of the email are thieves.

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  • Pray: for more fact-checking to be embarked on by Facebook and YouTube, and more airspace to be given to notify the public of false pictures, videos, phishing and stories. (Proverbs 12:19)