Conspiracy And Children

Did "5 celebrities" -- Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Lopez, celebrity couple Beyoncé Knowles and Jay Z Carter, Kanye West and Usher Raymond -- flee the United States after Sean "Diddy" Combs' arrest on sex crimes charges in September 2024? No, that's not true: News reports with photographs and social media posts show DiCaprio, Lopez, Knowles, Carter and Raymond all were in…

Did Navy SEALs raid a warehouse belonging to rapper Sean "Diddy" Combs and seize a stockpile of adrenochrome that he used as a drug at his orgies? No, that's not true: The story is from a website that regularly publishes fabricated content, and there's no proof that any such military operation ever took place. Adrenochrome has long been the subject…

Did the World Economic Forum develop a treaty including "pedophiles" in the "legally protected minority" category? No, that's not true: The site that posted the claim included a disclaimer that it makes "NO REPRESENTATIONS ABOUT THE ... ACCURACY OF THE INFORMATION ... CONTAINED ON THE SITE." Lead Stories found no evidence such a treaty ever existed. The publications boosting the…

Is measles vaccination proven to have caused "63 times more" deaths than measles in the United States between 2003 and 2018? No, that's not true: Lead Stories found zero credible sources confirming that. The claim that has been circulating on social media and beyond since at least 2015 manipulates the vaccine adverse effect reports, conflating coinciding events with causation that…

Did a source close to the British royal family say that Catherine, Princess of Wales, was "sacrificed" or "murdered," and then "replaced" with a "body double"? No, that's not true: The article that made the claim was published by a website known for spreading false claims and is not corroborated by any evidence. The article didn't include any direct quotes…

Is the moon a machine that is filled with computers? No, that's not true: The moon is a rock with a metallic core, according to NASA, the agency that has studied the moon and outer space for decades. The United States has landed men on the moon, and there have been multiple countries around the world that have sent spacecraft…

Is Angela Merkel the daughter of Adolf Hitler? No, that's not true: Merkel, the former German chancellor, was born in 1954 in Hamburg, West Germany. Hitler died on April 30, 1945, almost a decade before Merkel was born. Merkel's parents were Horst and Herlind Kasner, as her biography on Britannica states. Hitler had no children and only married Eva Braun…

Does a video shared on social media show authentic news coverage confirming that Disney child stars are genetically engineered humans? No, that's not true: The segment comes from the satirical website The Onion. The video was posted on The Onion in 2008. The claim reappeared in a post (archived here) on Instagram on February 8, 2024. The caption began: Had…

Does a viral video show a hidden underground route used for "trafficking"? No, that's not true: The video shows an old, now-defunct salt mine in Romania. It's open to the public and functions as a museum. The claim appeared in a post (archived here) on TikTok on March 16, 2023. The text overlay read: go do y'all's research on these…

Does a topless photo show New York Attorney General Letitia James? No, that's not true: This photo does not show James, but Stacey Plaskett, the U.S. delegate to Congress from the Virgin Islands, who was a victim of cybercrime. Two disgruntled ex-staffers pleaded guilty to federal cyber-related charges and were sentenced in 2018 for hacking her phone and disclosing private…