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Fake News Scam Sites Advertising On Real News Sites

Posted by kdawson on from the maze-of-twisty-passages dept.

Virtual_Raider writes "Wired is running a story about a new twist in the never-ending quest to prove P. T. Barnum's adage. Old: Scammers are creating fake news sites that look almost like the real thing. New: They are advertising on real news sites, making it difficult for unwary readers to catch on they are being duped with fake coverage of get-rich-quick scams. Among those running the scam 'news' ads are the Huffington Post and Salon. From the article: 'The story has art, it has a sidebar, there's weather, supposed reader comments — even ads. Steadman is described as "a mother from San Francisco" — at least, when I read the article. Thanks to cutting-edge reporting techniques perfected by News 5, she will automatically move to the geolocation of your internet IP address when you read it. Look, she lives right in your neighborhood!'" Forbes also wrote about the scam news sites a couple of weeks back.

15 of 128 comments (clear)

  1. Yeah, they're all claiming Michael Jackson died... by kclittle · · Score: 4, Funny

    ... just to get you to click thru

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  2. Real News? by Bigby · · Score: 2, Funny

    What site brings real news? (except Slashdot, of course)

  3. We are all traveling... by wrekd · · Score: 3, Funny

    We are all traveling on the disinformation superhighway.

  4. Fake news site by MyLongNickName · · Score: 4, Funny

    I got redirected to an obviously fake news site.

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  5. Re:You almost got me... by Freetardo+Jones · · Score: 4, Funny

    You thought something posted by kdawson was a real article? You must be new here.

  6. Re:Yeah, they're all claiming Michael Jackson died by Abreu · · Score: 2, Funny

    And we all know he's undead... Like in the movie Death Becomes Her, Jacko has been touching himself up with latex and paint for years...

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  7. Re:What news sites is it showing up on? by geekoid · · Score: 4, Funny

    Now what did the Onion do to deserve being listed with HuffPo~

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  8. Obligatory by aztektum · · Score: 1, Funny

    I got redirected to an obviously fake news site.

    Fixed

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  9. You know how I know it's fake? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    The comments down at the bottom are all spelled correctly and using proper grammer.

  10. "ideas like effective government action" by smittyoneeach · · Score: 5, Funny

    Wow, that beats "vegan haggis" for oxymoron of the day.

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  11. Re:Yeah, they're all claiming Michael Jackson died by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    I'm pretty sure he had been touching himself with latex, but not in the manner in which you stated...

  12. Oh Come On by castorvx · · Score: 3, Funny

    Fox has to get traffic somehow.

  13. Since when by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    is The Huffington Post consider a "news" site?

    If I want to listen to idiots foaming at the mouth and blaming all the world's problems on a President who's been out of office for almost six months, I'll turn on MSNBC.

  14. Kinda funny if you live someplace remote... by keysdisease · · Score: 2, Funny

    It was pretty easy for me to spot these... cause I live the FL Keys and they tagged everything with Key West.... mom, internet entrepreneur, teeth whitening, etc. Except for moms, we don't have any of those... especially white teeth...

  15. Re:Actually the spammers have already started that by cheftw · · Score: 2, Funny

    Thanks for the info, just started this 3 weeks ago. I've gotten 2 checks for a total of $1900, pretty cooll.

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