Fake APEC Website Satirizes Waikiki Shooting
Serious APEC followers beware: There’s a fake APEC 2011 website and Twitter account out there.
The fake Twitter handle, looks a lot like the real one: .
The website URLs are also deceitfully similar: (fake) and (real).
The fake site was created yesterday by John Sweeney, listing an address out of Marina Del Rey, Calif., according to the WHOIS registry.
Both the fake account and site appear to have a sense of humor. The website is modeled after the real one, but the posts — which riff off of real events happening on the ground here — are satirical.
A “” entitled “Apec (sic) apologizes for shooting” about a Saturday morning incident at McDonald’s involving a federal agent in Honolulu for APEC, for example, makes light of the serious situation:
“The suspect, Christopher Deedy, was apprehended close to the crime scene where he was found consuming a cheeseburger.”
“APEC released a statement late on Sunday evening explaining … ‘We are offering emergency funding for McDonald’s to re-open as soon as possible as we know our delegates and guests enjoy their fries.’
“A shift manager at the McDonald’s said that the store would likely be open for lunch on Monday with some new additions to the .99 value menu including the McRib and is pleased to announce that Waikiki is the test market for a new sandwich, “The GMOre Burger produced in collaboration with Monsanto.”
The Twitter account has only nine posts so far. Tweets claim to share photos of “APEC delegates arriving in Honolulu” actually link readers to photos of in an and a disturbing animation of an apparently naked child walking between .
Here’s your cheat sheet to knowing which of the accounts and websites is real after you’ve forgotten the “official” word order:
- The fake uses an avatar with a monochrome blue map background, instead of the colorful blue and green APEC 2011 logo.
- The fake Twitter account is also following some 700 users, while the real one is only following 10.
- Follow APEC 24/7 on our live blog.*
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http://www.tumblr.com/blog/apecliveblog
