"Israeli Prime Minister Hospitalized" Shared by Hundreds of Thousands on SNS... News Verified

After the Israel-Hamas War, Resurgence
Concerns Raised Over Worsening 'X' Negative Feedback Loop

As the Israel-Hamas war intensifies, fake news is rampant on social networking services (SNS). Fake news claiming that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was rushed to a hospital has been shared by hundreds of thousands of netizens.

Since Hamas's terror attack on Israel, false news has been spreading on SNS platforms such as X (formerly Twitter). For example, on the 7th (local time), a post claiming that Prime Minister Netanyahu was urgently transported to Israel's Sheba Medical Center was read by about 700,000 netizens.

False news that Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel, was urgently transported to the hospital. [Image source=X (formerly Twitter)]

At first glance, this post does not look much different from a typical news article. The post's author is named "Jerusalem Post," similar to an actual media outlet, and to increase credibility, it included a photo of Netanyahu appearing to cough.

Additionally, past photos and videos have been circulated as if they were real-time information. Even before the Israeli Air Force bombed the Gaza Strip in retaliation for Hamas's surprise attack, posts on X shared headlines like "Breaking: Israeli Air Force is attacking Gaza Strip." However, the video shared in that post was confirmed to be footage from an operation that took place in May.

Moreover, fake documents claiming that the White House approved over 10 trillion won in military aid to the Israeli government have also been circulating.

SNS platforms including X have recently been criticized as hotbeds of fake news. Since Russia's invasion of Ukraine last year, many unverified false information pieces have been widely shared.

Some point out that X's self-regulation against fake news has worsened. In the past, during its Twitter days, X countered fake news by evaluating socially influential figures and granting them blue check marks under the "Blue Check" account policy.

However, after Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, acquired X, the blue check mark system was changed to be uniformly granted to paid subscribers of the service.