A new virus allegedly called “WTC Survivor” virus allegedly threatens to turn victims computers into a digital disaster by deleting dynamic link libraries. Fortunately it’s a hoax, albeit one in very bad taste. Here’s the original e-mail: Date Collected: 3/21/2002 “BIGGGG TROUBLE !!!! DO NOT OPEN “WTC Survivor” It is a virus that will erase … Read more
Forget about faulty wings and bad engines — the “killer spiders on airplanes” hoax wants you to believe that scary South American arachnids are preying on our friends in Chicago. Here’s the original e-mail: WARNING An article by Dr. Beverly Clark, in the Journal of the United Medical Association (JUMA), the mystery behind recent deaths … Read more
Has the dead hand of a notorious atheist succeeded in getting the federal government to ban the word “God” from America’s airways, thus forcing CBS to cancel Touched by an Angel? In a word, no. This hoax has been circulating since 1975, and shows no signs of going away, despite the fact that its primary … Read more
The SlaveMaster e-mail has returned to stalk the Internet, this time donning the persona of “MonkeyMan935” in an attempt to scare uninformed men and women. Like its predecessor, the MonkeyMan935 e-mail is a hoax. To date, we’ve captured two versions of the new hoax: Date Captured: Nov. 6, 2002 The state Police are warning all … Read more
Why buy the world a Coke, when you can just forward an e-mail? That question’s at the heart of an e-mail hoax that promises free cola for fowarding a certain e-mail around the Net. Here’s the original e-mail: Date Captured: April 17, 2000 Subject: FREE COCA COLA FOR A MONTH Coca-Cola is offering four free … Read more
When I was a kid, I told an outrageous lie: that my grade school principal was going to pay me .25 cents for each piece of garbage I picked up at the school. My parents immediately saw it for the fiction that it was. Unfortunately, people on the net aren’t quite so observant when it … Read more
An e-mail claiming to be raising money to save a kid dying of brain cancer claims you don’t have a heart if you delete the message (no doubt it will have been stolen by a rampaging band of kidney thieves looking to branch out into new markets). A later version, captured in December, includes a … Read more
“Mommy … it hurts!” Those words struck fear into the heart of Kevin Archer’s mother … but that fear was nothing compared to the horror she felt the next day when she found her son dead of a heroin overdose. The child had been playing in a McDonald’s ball pit when a heroin-filled syringe had … Read more
An e-mail claiming that a new patriotic Pepsi soda can had the words “Under God” striken from its design is a hoax. Date collected: 8/12/2002 Pepsi has a new patriotic can coming out with pictures of the Empire State Bldg. and the Pledge of Allegiance on them. But Pepsi forgot two little words on the … Read more
Here’s the set-up: a helicopter is raising a diver up out of the ocean when suddenly an immense great white shark jumps out of the water for a quick (and fatal) bite. It sounds like a scene from a movie (say Jaws II or Deep Blue Sea, and it seems to unbelievable to be real. … Read more