A BuzzFeed News analysis has identified the 50 fake news stories that attracted the most engagement on Facebook this year. Together they totaled 21.5 million likes, comments, and shares. Of these stories, 23 were about US politics, two were about women using their vaginas as murder weapons, and one was about a clown doll that actually was a person the whole time.
BuzzFeed News defined “fake news” as news that was verifiably “100 percent false” and drawn from a list of 96 websites purposely created to disseminate false information.
You can read the full list of stories, but here are the top five:
- “Obama Signs Executive Order Banning The Pledge Of Allegiance In Schools Nationwide”
- “Woman arrested for defecating on boss’ desk after winning the lottery”
- “Pope Francis Shocks World, Endorses Donald Trump for President, Releases Statement”
- “Trump Offering Free One-Way Tickets to Africa & Mexico for Those Who Wanna Leave America”
- “Cinnamon Roll Can Explodes Inside Man’s Butt During Shoplifting Incident”
Notably, the domain name for the top fake news story of the year is “abcnews.com.co.” In a November interview with The Verge, Professor Nicole A. Cooke of the University of Illinois’ School of Information Sciences cited the slight modification of familiar domains as a particularly dangerous and common tactic for fake news sites. They make the source look reputable at first glance. The man who operates abcnews.com.co told The Washington Post that he believes his websites were a key factor in the election of Donald Trump.