Fake News: Malian 'Spiderman' Did NOT Lose French Citizenship, Does NOT Face Deportation

Fact Check

  • by: Maarten Schenk
Fake News: Malian 'Spiderman' Did NOT Lose French Citizenship, Does NOT Face Deportation

Is France revoking the citizenship of Mamoudou Gassama, the illegal immigrant from Mali who was naturalized after rescuing a child that was about to fall from a balcony by climbing up a building (which earned him the nickname "Spiderman")? No, that's not true: the story was made up by a website that claims to be satire but which is in effect part of a network of fake news websites run from Ghana. There is no truth to the news.

The story originated from an article published by News@7 on July 11, 2018 titled "Malian 'Spiderman' loses French citizenship and faces deportation - News@7" (archived here) which opened:

Mamoudou Gassama, the Malian 'Spiderman' in a viral video who saved a kid from falling from a balcony in France has had his French citizenship revoked.

The Malian migrant who was hailed as a hero after mounting a daring rescue to save the small boy dangling from a balcony in Paris was made a French citizen.

In a report by the Sûreté nationale, the National Police of France, Mamoudou Gassama's heroic rescue was staged.

Users on social media only saw this title, description and thumbnail:

Malian 'Spiderman' loses French citizenship and faces deportation - News@7

it was planned

The site News@7 carries a satire disclaimer at the bottom of the page (which it copied from another site):

Your Attention Needed
sat·ire ~ˈsaˌtī(ə)r
noun
the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, OR ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.
If you disagree with the definition of satire or have decided it is synonymous with "comedy," you should really just move along.

No French news websites reported on the story so it is pretty safe to say it is fake news.

In addition the site contains ID's from Google's Adsense advertisting network that were also found on sites that were part of a large network of fake news sites run out of Ghana. We suspect the same people are trying to build up a new network after the previous one shut down after being exposed.

Global Fake News Network Responsible For Dozens of Death Hoaxes Shuts Down After Ghana Connections Revealed | Lead Stories

STORY UPDATED: check for updates below. On April 17, 2018 former First Lady Barbara Bush passed away but a full day earlier an article prematurely announcing her death from a website pretending to be CNN managed to rack up a combined 2.3 million likes, shares and comments on Facebook.

We wrote about news7pm.com before, here are our most recent articles that mention the site:

Want to inform others about the accuracy of this story?

See who is sharing it (it might even be your friends...) and leave the link in the comments.:


  Maarten Schenk

Maarten Schenk is the co-founder and COO/CTO of Lead Stories and an expert on fake news and hoax websites. He likes to go beyond just debunking trending fake news stories and is endlessly fascinated by the dazzling variety of psychological and technical tricks used by the people and networks who intentionally spread made-up things on the internet.

Read more about or contact Maarten Schenk

About Us

International Fact-Checking Organization EFCSN Meta Third-Party Fact Checker

Lead Stories is a fact checking website that is always looking for the latest false, misleading, deceptive or inaccurate stories, videos or images going viral on the internet.
Spotted something? Let us know!.

Lead Stories is a:


WhatsApp Tipline

Have a tip or a question? Chat with our friendly robots on WhatsApp!

Add our number +1 (404) 655-4223, follow this link or scan the image below with your phone:

@leadstories

Subscribe to our newsletter

* indicates required

Please select all the ways you would like to hear from Lead Stories LLC:

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. For information about our privacy practices, please visit our website.

We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By clicking below to subscribe, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing. Learn more about Mailchimp's privacy practices here.

Most Read

Most Recent

Share your opinion