Making money out of a disaster: Fake news in Myanmar quake

Profiteers have flooded social media with fake news and bogus videos since a powerful earthquake devastated Myanmar on March 28, exploiting the chaos with clickbait that can reap tens of thousands in ad revenues, digital activists say.

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Be it sensational images that go viral or fake rescue tales, the schemes prey on the heightened fears and appetite for news that follow any disaster or outbreak of war.

"People just have to assume there's a lot of false information that circulates. They should be aware there are people making money off of false information," said Mr Darrell West, a senior technology researcher at the Brookings Institution think-tank.

The death toll from Myanmar's 7.7-magnitude quake has risen to more than 3,600, according to state media, with a further 5,000 injured and hundreds of people still missing.

Grassroots group Digital Insight Lab, which runs Facebook pages countering misinformation and hate speech in Myanmar, said it had seen viral posts claiming to show the devastation of the disaster even though the videos were shot in Syria and Malaysia, or created from scratch by artificial intelligence (AI).

"Many of these reports repurpose photos and videos from unrelated past incidents, while others leverage AI-generated content to fabricate false narratives," said research officer Windy, who used a pseudonym for safety.

Misinformation and disinformation are common on social media following catastrophes, digital experts say, be it miscaptioned images, fake videos or false narratives about rescue efforts.