Detained for five days! Exposing the three-step routine of online bloggers to spread rumors for attention

Some time ago, a video about a girl being beaten at a school in Xincai County, Henan Province, attracted attention online. When words like "female student, beating, school bullying" appeared in a concentrated manner, they quickly attracted the attention of netizens.

Is it true that “a female student in Xincai, Henan was beaten up”?

On May 6, the Internet Information Office of the Zhumadian Municipal Committee of Henan Province received a video report, which showed that a female student was being insulted and beaten by several other female students around her. There were also words marked on the screen, which read: "A certain class in a certain school in Xincai, it doesn't matter whose children they are." As the incident in the video may involve school bullying, the Zhumadian Internet Information Office attached great importance to it and immediately launched a verification investigation.

Huang Xin, a staff member of the Network Security Coordination Section of the Zhumadian Municipal Party Committee's Cyberspace Administration Office: The Zhumadian Cyberspace Administration Office immediately linked up with the Xincai Cyberspace Administration, Public Security, and Education Departments to verify the relevant information. After verification, the people involved in the video are not students of Xincai County School.

Li Xiaochong, instructor of Yueliangwan Police Station of Xincai County Public Security Bureau, Zhumadian City: We contacted the relevant middle school for verification. After verification by the school, it was found that the school did not have the people in the video, and no fighting or bullying had occurred in the school.

The video mentioned that the incident did not happen in the school. Where did the video come from?

There has never been a fight at the school mentioned in the video, and the people involved in the video are not students of the school. So where did this video come from?

After investigation, the police found that the publisher of the rumor video was a local man named Cao from Xincai County. He sent the edited video to a WeChat group on April 18, and it was quickly spread to more than 60 WeChat groups. Soon after, the rumor video appeared on multiple short video platforms, causing a bad social impact.

Li Xiaochong, instructor of Yueliangwan Police Station, Xincai County Public Security Bureau, Zhumadian City, Henan Province: After verification, we are sure that this video was maliciously edited and released. We contacted Cao Moumou, who said he was working in Wuhai City, Inner Mongolia. On May 17, 2024, we summoned Cao Moumou to appear in court.

Blogger detained for 5 days for posting video clips of bullying in other places

A video of a beating without detailed information such as time and location was edited by Cao and accompanied by false text, and then it was rumored to be a school bullying incident in a middle school in Xincai County. This irresponsible behavior not only caused anxiety and panic among students and parents, but also brought huge negative impact to the middle school. Why did Cao do this?

According to the Xincai County police, while surfing the Internet, Cao saw a video of a beating. Without verifying the specific information, Cao downloaded the video and edited it twice. In order to increase the so-called "authenticity" of the video, he also added his child's school and class information to the video, and then posted it on the Internet for dissemination.

Li Xiaochong, instructor of Yueliangwan Police Station of Xincai County Public Security Bureau in Zhumadian City, Henan Province: Cao confessed that he did not understand the law and in order to attract attention, he downloaded a video of a fight on the Internet and added words such as "Xincai County XX Middle School, look whose child this is" to it. He then edited it using some editing software, maliciously edited it and posted it in a WeChat group.

Huang Xin, a staff member of the Network Security Coordination Section of the Zhumadian Municipal Party Committee’s Cyberspace Administration: This information not only has a negative impact on a school in Xincai County, but also seriously affects the physical and mental health of minors.

In response to Cao's illegal acts of piecing together and editing online videos, tampering with the time and place of occurrence, and fabricating and spreading rumors, the Xincai County police imposed a five-day administrative detention on Cao in accordance with Article 25, Item 1 of the "Public Security Administration Punishment Law of the People's Republic of China".

School bullying is a hot topic that the general public is very concerned about, and the internet blogger Cao fabricated rumors just to gain attention, completely disregarding the adverse effects that spreading rumors would have on normal social order.

The reporter found that the routine of the online blogger Cao Mou to spread rumors can be roughly divided into the following steps:

The first step is to download a "beating" video without specific time and location information from the Internet, and then blur the source of the original video through secondary editing to make it more misleading;

The second step is to enhance the so-called "authenticity" of the video by claiming that the downloaded video is from a certain middle school where their children study, and adding false text descriptions;

The third step is to spread it through social media such as WeChat groups, attracting attention and causing adverse effects.

In addition to the rumor just disclosed, what other rumors have been fabricated recently by internet bloggers in order to gain traffic and attract attention?

A woman mistook a cemetery in Turpan for a scenic spot and took wedding photos?

Recently, a piece of information that "a woman mistook a cemetery for a scenic spot and spent 10,000 yuan on her wedding photos" sparked heated discussion.

In response to this, the Xinjiang Desert Earth Art Museum responded through its official account. After comparison and verification, the wedding photos were taken at the Huoyan Mountain Ten Thousand Buddha Palace Scenic Area in Turpan. The buildings and sculptures in the scenic area were built entirely according to the principles of raw earth art modeling, and have a natural charm. It is a modern and mature display of ancient Western Region raw earth art, and not a "tomb" as netizens said in the comment section.

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The rumored picture is an introduction screen of a positioning bracelet uploaded on April 11, 2022. Recently, relevant text "Shenzhen positioning will automatically alarm if it stays for 15 seconds" was added and uploaded to new media platforms for dissemination, causing adverse social impacts on Shenzhen's sanitation industry.

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After verification by multiple departments in Nan'an District, Chongqing, no residential building fires have occurred in the district recently. The video circulated online is actually "On August 1, 2023, a high-rise residential building in Almaty, Kazakhstan caught fire. Many people upstairs jumped out of the window to escape and were caught by residents downstairs with quilts."