Fake news: Racist stories making the rounds on WhatsApp

Most of the time, these messages has no source of origin.

They are not held by copyrights and other Intellectual Property or IP laws.

But people keep sharing them hoping it will be a funny moment in the day.

But these messages can get a lot of people up in arms.

Here’s an extract of what we call the Aussie betel WhatsApp story.

It is making its round in Malaysia and soon enough it will be in Singapore and beyond.

We called it Aussie betel story because it is set in somewhere in Australia.

It targets the Indians who have the habit of eating betel leaves.

The underlying message seems to be about not spit from the car while driving in Aussie land!

But it is racist in nature.

And these stories shared in messages, whether personal or in groups, are part of the ‘fake news’ arguments.

The story starts with a nice anecdote.

It says Australia is an expensive country but the civic services are of the best standards.

However, it describes the incident of an elderly lady spitting from a car window.

An Aussie Lady who was folling the car behind thought the person was vomiting blood.

She took quick action to call for help and a medic helicopter landed on the highway.

But there is a catch.

For these services, our man had to pay Australian Dollar 3500.

With these unplanned heavy financial charges, our man was in shock.

He blasted or scolded his old aged mother for chewing betel nuts!

Though the attempt was to create a funny story, it falls into the agenda of those trying to curb on free flow of information.

WFTV will come with other such stories to highlight why one must be careful before they forward messages without source.