Posted on Jan 7, 2023
A fake tweet spurred an anti-vaccine harassment campaign against a doctor
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When Dr. Natalia Solenkova woke up Monday morning, she was greeted with a flood of Twitter notifications on her phone. The Miami critical care physician had hundreds of new followers, and they, along with thousands of others on Twitter, were angry with her.
In tweets, comments and direct messages across Twitter and other social platforms, strangers demanded to know why she had deleted a tweet that read: “I will never regret the vaccine. Even if it turns out I injected actual poison and have only days to live. My heart and is was in the right place. I got vaccinated out of love, while antivaxxers did everything out of hate. If I have to die because of my love for the world, then so be it. But I will never regret or apologize for it.”
Solenkova hadn’t deleted the tweet. In fact, she hadn’t written it at all. It was what misinformation researchers call a “cheap fake,” a term for a piece of fake media such as an image or video that takes little effort to produce. Someone had clumsily altered one of Solenkova’s posts to portray a blind, even deadly, zealotry for Covid vaccines and a vilification of anti-vaccine activists.
In tweets, comments and direct messages across Twitter and other social platforms, strangers demanded to know why she had deleted a tweet that read: “I will never regret the vaccine. Even if it turns out I injected actual poison and have only days to live. My heart and is was in the right place. I got vaccinated out of love, while antivaxxers did everything out of hate. If I have to die because of my love for the world, then so be it. But I will never regret or apologize for it.”
Solenkova hadn’t deleted the tweet. In fact, she hadn’t written it at all. It was what misinformation researchers call a “cheap fake,” a term for a piece of fake media such as an image or video that takes little effort to produce. Someone had clumsily altered one of Solenkova’s posts to portray a blind, even deadly, zealotry for Covid vaccines and a vilification of anti-vaccine activists.
A fake tweet spurred an anti-vaccine harassment campaign against a doctor
Posted from nbcnews.com
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PO1 William "Chip" Nagel good day Brother William, always informational and of the most interesting. Thanks for sharing, have a blessed day!
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PO1 William "Chip" Nagel
..."The episode was later republished without the discussion of the fake tweet.
Weinstein tweeted that the takedown was the only way to “protect the person who was being impersonated.” Still, videos of the segment remain online, circulated by accounts not associated with Rogan. One video on Twitter has been viewed more than 5 million times.
Rogan’s publicist did not return a request for comment. Weinstein did not return a request for comment.
“You spend 11 minutes butchering my name, showing my picture, and then people Google me,” Solenkova said, adding that she feared for the lasting impact the fakery and its amplification might have on her career as a traveling physician.
“I’m doing my best,” she said. “I just know that I didn’t write this. But will it pop up in a complaint to a medical board? In my Google results? I’m trying to stay calm and think, ‘they made idiots of themselves and twitter lost credibility,’ but people need to know that this can happen to any of us.”
..."The episode was later republished without the discussion of the fake tweet.
Weinstein tweeted that the takedown was the only way to “protect the person who was being impersonated.” Still, videos of the segment remain online, circulated by accounts not associated with Rogan. One video on Twitter has been viewed more than 5 million times.
Rogan’s publicist did not return a request for comment. Weinstein did not return a request for comment.
“You spend 11 minutes butchering my name, showing my picture, and then people Google me,” Solenkova said, adding that she feared for the lasting impact the fakery and its amplification might have on her career as a traveling physician.
“I’m doing my best,” she said. “I just know that I didn’t write this. But will it pop up in a complaint to a medical board? In my Google results? I’m trying to stay calm and think, ‘they made idiots of themselves and twitter lost credibility,’ but people need to know that this can happen to any of us.”
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