Boston, MA 09/12/2014 (wallstreetpr) – On the 9/11 anniversary in the U.S., a Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) page with over 14,500 fans triggered hoax of active shooting, which eventually led to panic in California’s Marine Corps base. The self-acclaimed “Senior Lance Corporal” wrote on the fan page that Las Pulgas area at Camp Pendleton had an active shooter. Camp Pendleton hosts approximately 70,000 civilian and military personnel and is situated in North of San Diego. The post said that all marines were asked to lock themselves in the rooms only.
A Digital Bomb Threat
The entire situation can be seen as something that is digital equal of the rumours of bomb threat. The situation’s seriousness can be underscored with the fact that while releasing a press release, the base officials also said that all the law enforcement employees diligently followed instructions and protocols for alleged shooting incident.
The information, which was later deleted from the page, was shared over 175 times by the worried people.
A Hoax That Meant More than Just a Joke
A Police Department dispatcher at Camp Pendleton, Eric Moore told The Business Insider that there were no evidences of any active shooter, which meant that this was all nothing more than hoax. Mr. Moore however said that a range of phone calls were received with everyone sourcing news to Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) and also Twitter Inc (NYSE:TWTR).
After the rumour spread across the social media networks, the page said that the shooter was detained. It is quite clear that there was no shooter in the first place, but the hoax was indeed more than just a joke. Earlier too, Task & Purpose editor-in-chief, Brian Jones had written an “exposing article” regarding reality behind such pages that are used for racist and sexist jokes in Marines. Of course, this incident highlights that rather than being just harmless jokes, the posts like these have more power that trespassed the Internet boundary.
