Verified accounts spread fake news release about a Biden $8 billion aid package to Israel
A doctored White House press release posted online falsely claimed that the Biden administration had authorized $8 billion in emergency aid to Israel on Saturday. The fact that it was faked didn’t stop it from being posted across the internet and rising to the top of Google search results.
The faked document is one of the most far-reaching instances of misinformation to come out of the most recent violent conflict between Hamas and Israel, fooling several online publications into writing full articles about the fake news, which are still surfacing prominently in online search results.
The faked document appears to be an edited version of President Joe Biden’s July memo announcing $400 million in aid to Ukraine. Despite images of the faked document appearing on social media, it was never published on the White House website or in the government’s Federal Register of presidential documents.
The faked document first started appearing on social media accounts Saturday morning. Around noon on Saturday, a collection of verified accounts on X, formerly Twitter, began disseminating the fake release. Verified accounts are eligible for monetization on the platform. [Continue reading…]